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MAIN  QUESTIONS 


WJLLARD  CHAMBERLAIN  SELLECK 


UBRARY  OF  RELIGIOUS  THOUGHT 


4^ 


NOV    f^   1916 


Main  Questions  in  Religion 

A  Study  of  Fundamentals 

CRANE    THEOLOGICAL  SCHOOL  LECTURES 
AND   OTHER   ESSAYS 

BY 

WILLARD  CHAMBERLAIN  SELLECK,  D.D. 

Author  of  "The  Spiritual  Outlook"  and  "The  New 
Appreciation  of  the  Bible" 

^  .  -        ,.    . 


BOSTON:    RICHARD    G.   BADGER 

TORONTO:   THE  COPP  CLARK  CO.,  LIMITED 


COPTBIGHT,  1916,   BY  WiLLARD   ChAMBERLAIN  SeLLECK 


All  Rights  Reserved 


Made  in  the  United  States  of  America. 


The  Gorham  Press,  Boston,  U.  S.  A. 


TO    THE   MEMOKY  OF 
A   DEAR  AND   BEAUTIFUL  DAUGHTER 


PREFACE 

NO  lengthy  preface  is  required  for  this  volume. 
Its  contents  must  speak  for  themselves. 
The  four  lectures  are  printed  exactly  as  they 
were  delivered,  at  Tufts  College,  Massachusetts,  in 
May,  1915.  They  aim  to  deal  candidly,  searchingly 
and  constructively  with  some  of  the  ultimate  problems 
of  human  life. 

The  two  "other  essays"  are  added  because  the  mat- 
ters of  which  they  treat  are  of  pressing  importance. 
The  purification  of  Christianity  through  the  elimina- 
tion of  its  historic  accretions  of  error  is  not  more  than 
half  accomplished  yet.  The  process  must  be  carried 
much  nearer  completion  before  this  exalted  religion 
can  achieve  its  rightful  and  powerful  leadership  of  the 
modern  world.  In  proportion  as  this  cleansing,  recti- 
fying work  goes  on,  Christianity  will  become  more  and 
more  the  effectual  spiritual  ally  of  the  great  demo- 
cratic movement,  which  alone  in  these  dark  days  ap- 
pears to  hold  out  the  promise  of  preserving  the  price- 
less principle  of  liberty  in  the  momentous  develop- 
ments impending  among  the  nations.  Together  a 
purified  Christianity  and  a  spiritualized  Democracy 
will  establish  the  reign  of  love  and  freedom,  alike  in 
the  individual  heart  and  in  all  social  relationships, 
and  thus  bring  in  the  era  of  permanent  peace  and  uni- 
versal prosperity  for  which  the  weary  race  has  waited 
too  long. 

WlIiLARD   C.   SeLLECK. 

68  Mendon  Road, 

Cumberland  Hill,  R.  I., 
June  7,  1916. 


CONTENTS 

Lectures 

CHAPTXB  VAOa 

I.  What  is  the  Great  Reality  in  Religion?    .  11 

II.  What  is  the  Validity  of  Faith?    ....  8S 

III.  What  Can  We  Know  op  God? 52 

IV.  What  ShallWeBelievei  About  Immortality?  77 

Other  Essays 

I.    Traditional    Christianity    and    Essential 

Christianity         lOS 

II.     Christianity  and  Democracy 12& 


LECTURES 


*^ Before  all  else,  it  behoves  us  to  secure  the  founda- 
tions of  our  spiritual  life.'* — Rudolf  EucJcen. 


MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 


WHAT     IS     THE    GREAT     REALITY    IN     RELIGION? 

WHEN  a  distinct  and  severe  shock  comes  to 
the  human  soul,  through  some  great  calam- 
ity or  bereavement,  fundamental  questions 
are  likely  to  be  raised  anew.  Secondary  matters  drop 
at  once  into  their  due  subordination,  while  thought  and 
feeling  wrestle  with  the  primary  problems  of  being 
and  the  meaning  of  existence  and  the  order  of  the 
universe.  Words  and  phrases  lightly  uttered  in  happy 
hours  suddenly  acquire  a  doubtful  significance;  one 
is  almost  startled  by  a  fresh,  overpowering  sense  of 
the  mystery  of  life;  and,  without  rebellion  or  positive 
distrust,  he  simply  bows  himself  in  solemn  wonder, 
and  waits  for  light  "more  than  they  that  watch  for 
the  morning." 

At  the  present  moment  the  world  is  in  the  midst  of 
a  social  cataclysm  whose  appalling  destructiveness 
staggers  the  stoutest  heart.  The  frightful  conflict 
which  is  devastating  Europe  is  like  the  inundation  of  a 
continent.  No  man  can  measure  the  magnitude  of  the 
disaster,  or  in  imagination  conceive  its  far-reaching 
consequences.  Inevitably,  therefore,  it  impresses  and 
oppresses  every  thoughtful  person;  a  mood  of  un- 
wonted seriousness  prevails  among  all  classes ;  and 
many  are  asking  what  is  the  relation  of  this  gigantic 

11 


12  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

catastrophe  to  the  spiritual  faith  which  heretofore  has 
sustained  men's  hearts.  What  is  essential  and  sub- 
stantial in  that  faith,  what  is  vital  and  enduring  in 
all  our  thinking  and  believing,  in  all  our  teaching  and 
preaching,  so  that  we  may  still  speak  to  one  another 
some  honest  word  of  hope  and  healing? 

Such  a  sober  and  searching  attitude  comes  at  a 
time  when,  from  other  causes,  we  have  been  led  to  look 
into  the  heart  of  things  rather  than  upon  their  sur- 
face. For  our  age  has  been  an  expansive  and  critical 
one;  the  achievements  of  the  nineteenth  century  im- 
mensely broadened  and  deepened,  human  inquiry  in 
every  direction;  and  the  twentieth  century  finds  us 
trying  to  ascertain  and  utilize  the  net  values  of  all 
this  investigating,  revolutionary  thinking.  As  in  par- 
liamentary proceedings  it  often  happens  that,  after 
the  consideration  of  many  side  issues,  with  the  adop- 
tion or  rejection  of  amendments  and  counter-amend- 
ments, a  point  is  at  length  reached  where  the  main 
question  is  moved  and  put  to  vote,  so  it  is  in  the 
intellectual  deliberations  of  our  time :  we  have  discussed 
a  thousand  incidental  or  collateral  interests,  pursuing 
argument  and  research  into  every  possible  ramifica- 
tion; and  we  are  now  ready — at  least  some  of  us  are 
ready — to  try  to  decide,  for  ourselves  at  any  rate, 
some  of  the  main  questions  of  belief  and  conduct,  leav- 
ing non-essentials  where  they  belong,  on  one  side.  In 
other  words,  after  all  the  centuries  of  theological  de- 
bate and  ecclesiastical  strife,  and  especially  after  the 
last  hundred  years  of  scientific  and  philosophical  re- 
search, it  would  seem  as  though  it  ought  to  be  pos- 
sible to  sift  the  discussion  down  to  a  few  principal 
issues,  and  with  reference  to  these  to  find  some  work- 
ing theory  of  life  that  may  approve  itself  at  once  to 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION  13 

our  clearest  understanding,  our  deepest  moral  instincts, 
our  purest  affections  and  our  holiest  aspirations.  Such 
an  attainment  were  surely  desirable;  and  undoubtedly 
there  are  thousands  of  earnest  people  who,  weary  of 
profitless  controversy  and  likewise  of  skepticism,  yet 
perplexed  and  bewildered,  and  often  sorrowing  and 
yearning,  are  really  hungry  for  some  vital  and  valid 
message  touching  the  most  important  things  of  life, 
whereon  they  may  stay  their  souls. 

If  the  present  writer  may  hope  to  offer  any  frag- 
ments of  so  good  and  great  a  message,  it  will  only  be 
because,  after  thirty  years  of  service  in  the  pastoral 
ministry  of  the  Christian  Church,  followed  by  four 
3'ears  of  leisure  for  reading  and  reflection,  in  the  midst 
of  which  he  was  called  to  drink  a  deep  draught  from 
the  cup  of  sorrow,  he  may  claim  to  express  his  con- 
victions with  serious  thoughtfulness,  with  absolute  can- 
dor and  with  a  constructive  purpose.  He  sincerely 
desires  to  find  some  fixed  stake  in  all  this  maddening 
maze  of  things  to  which  his  own  spirit  may  cling,  and 
to  do  what  he  can  to  help  his  fellowmen  to  reach  a 
similar  security. 

Phillips  Brooks  defined  preaching  as  the  communi- 
cation of  truth  through  personality.  The  personality 
of  preacher  or  teacher  is  indeed  an  important  factor, 
but  it  is  like  the  stained-glass  window:  the  blended 
hues  of  the  light  which  it  transmits  are  produced  by 
the  vari-colored  medium,  but  the  light  itself  is  from 
without;  and  always  we  have  to  remember  that  the 
sunshine  is  infinitely  greater  than  the  window  or  the 
soft  radiance  which  it  diffuses  within.  If  it  is  mainly 
our  own  personal  experience  that  enables  us  to  "speak 
that  we  do  know,  and  testify  that  we  have  seen,"  we 
must  not  forget  that  other  men  have  had  other  experi- 


14  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

ences,  and  that  the  power  and  beauty  of  truth  and 
goodness  and  love  far,  far  exceed  all  that  can  be  com- 
prehended in  any  single  human  life. 

These  thoughts  bring  us  naturally  to  a  considera- 
tion of  the  particular  question  which  meets  us  at  the 
threshold  of  our  study:  What  is  the  Great  Reality 
in  Religion?  For  religion  is,  in  the  highest  degree, 
both  subjective  and  objective.  Our  estimate  of  it  is 
formed  by  our  personal  experience  (or  lack  of  ex- 
perience) of  it  and  by  our  observation  of  its  mani- 
festations in  the  world  around  us  and  behind  us.  Al- 
ways it  presents  these  two  aspects,  and  it  is  easy 
to  magnify  either  of  them  at  the  expense  of  the  other. 
Therefore,  if  we  would  understand  it  aright,  we  must 
look  both  within  and  without,  and  must  exercise  all 
our  powers  of  intelligent  perception,  discrimination, 
and  appreciation;  for  it  is  so  large  and  vital  an  in- 
terest, and  its  influence  is  so  manifold  and  pervasive, 
that  we  can  hardly  hope  to  discern  its  essential  na- 
ture and  its  deepest  import  unless  we  try  to  contem- 
plate it  both  sympathetically  and  critically. 

1.  Perhaps  it  is  best  to  look  first  within.  For  it 
is  only  as  we  search  our  own  hearts  that  we  can  find 
a  key  to  other  hearts,  only  as  we  read  our  own  inner 
experiences  that  we  can  learn  the  universal  language 
which  tells  the  story  of  common  human  aspirations. 
Just  as  reason,  love,  joy  and  sorrow  in  ourselves  en- 
able us,  and  alone  can  enable  us,  to  understand  the 
same  things  in  our  fellowmen,  so  it  is  in  religion:  the 
stirrings  of  the  religious  impulse  in  our  own  souls, 
prompting  or  restraining  us,  filling  us  with  awe  or 
fear  or  hope,  and  leading  us  to  outward  acts  of  de- 
votion or  abnegation  or  high  endeavor,  interpret  to 
us,  and   alone   can  interpret   to  us,   the  inspirations, 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION  15 

sacrifices,  prayers  and  penances  which,  along  with 
many  other  expressions,  reveal  the  wonderful  religious 
passion  that  lives  in  the  hearts  of  all  sorts  and  condi- 
tions of  men. 

And  surely  we  have  all  had  some  experience  of  the 
quickening  power  of  the  religious  spirit  in  the  soul, 
at  one  time  or  another,  in  greater  or  less  degree.  We 
may  not  have  understood  it,  indeed,  but  we  have 
felt  it;  and  feeling,  we  are  learning  more  and  more, 
lies  deeper  than  thought  and  cannot  always  be  ana- 
lyzed. Perhaps  it  was  a  vivid  sense  of  mystery — the 
mystery  of  the  world,  the  mystery  of  life,  the  mystery 
of  pain  and  sorrow  and  death — that  possessed  us,  even 
overwhelming  and  appalling  us,  that  made  us  cry  out 
after  the  Inscrutable  Power  above  and  around  us,  or 
compelled  us  to  bow  ourselves  in  submission  and  sup- 
plication, or  bade  us  lift  up  our  hearts  in  reverent 
adoration  and  trust.  Possibly  it  was  a  fresh  apprehen- 
sion of  the  sublimity  of  Nature — the  diamond-studded 
dome  of  heaven  at  night,  the  resplendent  sky  by  day, 
the  rolling  sea,  the  majestic  mountains,  the  rushing 
power  of  the  cataract,  the  stillness  of  the  deep  woods, 
or  the  quiet  beauty  of  some  pastoral  scene — that 
touched  us  with  solemn  wonder  and  longing  and  praise. 
Or  it  may  have  been  some  mighty  human  interest — a 
profound  social  agitation,  a  national  crisis,  a  great 
reform  or  a  terrible  war — that  moved  and  thrilled  us 
and  carried  us  out  of  ourselves,  and  thus  made  us 
realize  that  there  is  something  larger  and  better  than 
ourselves,  and  led  us  to  invoke  a  blessing  from  on  high 
upon  the  cause  which  engaged  our  hearts.  Or  perhaps 
it  was  some  more  private,  personal,  inner  struggle — 
some  conflict  with  temptation  and  sin,  some  wrestling 
in    prayer,    some   poignant    suffering   in    remorse    and 


16  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

grief — that  awakened  us  to  an  altogether  new  and 
cleansing  and  heahng  realization  of  the  fact  that  our 
lives  are  held  in  the  disciplinary  embrace  of  a  Moral 
Order  to  which  we  must  submit,  and  are  shot  through 
and  through  with  spiritual  forces  which  we  did  not 
originate.  And  yet,  very  likely,  it  was  just  a  sweet 
and  beautiful  insight  into  the  love  and  goodness  and 
gladness  of  the  world,  an  intuitive  perception  of  an 
indwelling  and  all-pervading  Benevolence,  a  profound 
consciousness  of  a  Holy  Spirit  within  and  without, 
above  and  around,  filling  the  universe  with  glory  and 
filling  our  hearts  with  ineffable  peace, — very  likely 
it  was  just  this  simple,  vital,  mystical  experience  which 
made  us  aware  of  the  Divine  Presence  and  bade  us  lift 
up  our  souls  in  spontaneous  gratitude  and  consecra- 
tion. 

If  in  any  of  these  ways,  to  any  extent,  we  have  felt 

"The  motion  of  a  hidden  fire 
That  glows  within  the  breast," 

we  know  at  least  a  little  bit  of  the  meaning  of  religion, 
and  are  thereby  prepared  to  understand  some  of  its 
workings  as  we  find  it  among  other  people, 

2.  If,  now,  we  turn  to  look  without,  we  immediately 
discover  that,  objectively  regarded,  religion  is  a  phe- 
nomenon which  fills  a  large  place  in  the  life  of  man- 
kind. 

First  of  all,  we  see  its  manifestations  in  our  sur- 
roundings and  among  our  associates, — in  churches, 
synagogues,  temples,  shrines  and  altars ;  in  painting, 
sculpture  and  music;  in  assembled  congregations  and 
in  ceremonies  of  worship,  in  which  we  join;  in  sermons, 
prayers  and  addresses ;  in  psalms  and  hymns  and 
spiritual   songs ;   in  sacred  writings,  in  holy  days,  in 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION  17 

processions  and  pilgrimages,  in  various  institutions 
and  in  manifold  forms  of  active  benevolence:  and  as 
we  witness  all  these  expressions  of  the  religious  spirit 
and  share  their  influence,  we  find  our  own  religious 
impulses  quickened  and  strengthened,  and  we  perceive 
that  religion  is  really  an  immense  factor  in  human 
affairs. 

In  the  second  place,  as  we  extend  our  observation 
or  reading,  we  learn  that  the  world  is  full  of  products 
of  the  religious  spirit  more  or  less  similar  to  these ; 
that  all  nations  and  tribes,  in  all  stages  of  culture, 
appear  to  have  their  religious  rites,  customs  and  be- 
liefs ;  that  there  is,  indeed,  the  widest  diversity  among 
these,  so  that  we  may  properly  speak  of  religion,  not 
as  one,  but  as  many,  and  may,  therefore,  compare 
one  religion  with  another;  and  yet  that  it  is  quite 
plain  that  these  different  religions  are,  after  all,  only 
different  forms  of  expression  of  the  one  underlying 
religious  spirit  or  impulse  that  seems  to  be  universal 
and  natural.  Then  when  the  scholars  take  us  further 
and  make  a  scientific  study  of  all  these  phenomena, 
as  they  have  been  doing  for  nearly  half  a  hundred 
years  now, — gathering  an  enormous  amount  of  in- 
formation bearing  on  the  subject,  testing,  sifting  and 
interpreting  this ;  comparing  all  the  principal  religions 
of  the  world,  classifying  them  and  tracing  them 
through  history;  translating  the  sacred  books  and  the 
inscriptions  of  the  most  ancient  nations,  and  collating 
their  teachings ;  digging  and  delving  among  the  monu- 
ments of  primitive  peoples,  or  patiently  studying  their 
customs,  or  even  sojourning  among  savage  tribes, — 
enriching  our  knowledge  by  their  researches  and  con- 
clusions, we  obtain  a  still  larger  view  of  this  great 
human  interest  which  we  call  religion,  and  are  com- 


18  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

pelled  to  acknowledge  that  it  has  always  been  one  of 
the  biggest,  most  vital  and  most  potent  forces  dis- 
played by  our  race.  The  more  thoroughly  we  in- 
vestigate the  matter,  the  more  firmly  will  this  judg- 
ment be  established. 

But  now  we  wish  to  ascertain  more  precisely,  if  we 
may,  the  real  nature  of  religion.  We  want  to  know,  if 
possible,  what  is  essential  and  what  non-essential  in 
it,  what  is  permanent  and  what  transient.  For  cer- 
tainly there  is  much  connected  with  it  that  is  incidental 
and  temporary,  much,  indeed,  that  is  erroneous  and 
baneful.  Can  we  separate  the  wheat  from  the  chaff, 
the  true  from  the  false,'' 

We  must  remember  that  religion,  broadly  viewed, 
is  involved  with  all  the  other  great  interests  of  life.  It 
is  not  a  disconnected,  unrelated,  insignificant  affair, 
although  it  may  sometimes  seem  so ;  but  is  rather  an 
integral  part  of  each  man's  whole  mental,  moral  and 
social  status, — sharing  in  his  general  personal  atti- 
tude and  outlook,  in  his  ideas,  sentiments,  convictions 
and  misgivings  regarding  many  things,  and  in  his  own 
peculiar  struggles,  joys  and  sorrows;  sharing,  too, 
in  the  customs  and  culture  of  the  social  group — the 
family,  tribe,  nation  or  church — to  which  he  belongs ; 
and,  among  advanced  peoples,  sharing  somehow  in  that 
indefinable  spirit  of  the  age  which  seems  to  brood  over 
each  stage  of  civilization.  Dr.  Daniel  G.  Brinton,  the 
eminent  American  ethnologist,  writing  about  the  re- 
ligions of  primitive  peoples,  says : 

"No  opinion  can  be  more  erroneous  than  the  one 
sometimes  advanced  that  savages  are  indifferent  to 
their  faiths.  On  the  contrary,  the  rule,  with  very  few 
exceptions,  is  that  religion  absorbs  nearly  the  whole 
life  of  a  man  under  primitive  conditions.     From  birth 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION  19 

to  death,  but  especially  during  adult  years,  his  daily 
actions  are  governed  by  ceremonial  laws  of  the  severest, 
often  the  most  irksome  and  painful  character.  He  has 
no  independent  action  or  code  of  conduct,  and  is  a 
very  slave  to  the  conditions  which  such  laws  create." 

Dr.  Brinton  approvingly  quotes  a  statement  by  Pro- 
fessor Granger  that  "reUgion  in  the  ancient  world 
comprised  every  social  function,"  and  adds : 

"What  was  true  in  those  ancient  days  is  equally 
so  in  this  age  among  savage  peoples.  Let  us  take  as 
an  example  the  Dyaks  of  Borneo.  A  recent  observer 
describes  them  as  utter  slaves  to  their  'superstitions,' 
that  is,  to  their  religion.  'When  they  lay  out  their  fields, 
gather  the  harvest,  go  hunting  or  fishing,  contract  a 
marriage,  start  on  an  expedition,  propose  a  commercial 
journey,  or  anything  of  importance,  they  always  con- 
sult the  gods,  offer  sacrifices,  celebrate  feasts,  study  the 
omens,  obtain  talismans,  and  so  on,  often  thus  losing 
the  best  opportunity  for  the  business  itself.'  "  ^ 

These  remarks  afford  a  hint  of  the  fact,  disclosed 
by  any  wide  study  of  religious  beliefs  and  practices, 
that  religion  is  closely  bound  up  with  all  the  rest  of 
the  thinking  and  doing  of  mankind,  according  to  the 
stage  or  development  which  any  given  individual  or 
group  or  age  may  have  reached.^ 

^"Religions  of  Primitive  Peoples,"  by  Daniel  G.  Brinton,  A.M., 
LL.D.,  Sc.D.,  Putnam's,  1897,  pp.  37-39. 

^  If  we  examine  ourselves  carefully,  we  shall  find  that  this  is 
true  of  ourselves;  our  religion  relates  itself  directly  to  the  total 
culture  of  the  present  generation,  insofar  as  we  share  it,— to  our 
degree  of  material  advancement,  our  education,  our  science  and 
philosophy,  our  government,  our  philanthropy,  and  all  our  social 
aspirations.  Because  these  interests  are  so  many  and  great,  and 
have  been  expanding  so  rapidly,  our  religious  ideas  and  activities 
are  in  both  a  foment  and  a  ferment,  a  state  of  unrest  and  de- 
velopment that  is  prophetic  of  something  higher  and  better.  If 
life  improves,  religion  wiU  improve;  if  religion  improves,  life  will 
improve.    They  are  mutually  involved. 


20  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

Moreover,  we  must  remember  that  what  may  seem 
crude  or  false  or  abominable  to  one  person,  generation, 
tribe,  communion  or  civilization  may  seem  very  sacred 
to  another.  Until  quite  recently  it  was  customary 
for  even  enlightened  Christians  to  call  the  peoples  of 
foreign  lands,  indiscriminately,  "heathen,"  using  the 
word  disdainfully  or  pityingly,  and  to  speak  of  their 
religious  rites  and  ceremonies  as  "outlandish  heathen- 
isms" or  "diabolical  superstitions," — indeed,  those  "re- 
ligions" were  actually  regarded  as  the  work  of  the 
Devil  and  his  imps.  But  the  experience  of  missionaries 
among  these  various  peoples  during  the  past  century, 
coupled  with  the  researches  of  the  scholars  who  have 
been  patiently  prosecuting  the  comparative  study  of 
religions,  both  ancient  and  modern,  both  backward  and 
advanced,  has  taught  us  to  take  a  larger  and  more 
sympathetic  view ;  so  that  we  now  see  that  even  the 
most  childish,  grotesque  or  cruel  customs  of  barbarian 
or  savage  tribes  are  to  them  the  consistent  expression 
of  their  religious  ideas  and  aspirations.  We  may  smile 
at  the  Pueblo  Indians  who  will  not  plant  their  corn 
without  a  religious  ceremony,^  or  at  the  Veddahs  of 
Ceylon  who  "dance  their  wild  nocturnal  dance  around 
a  huge  arrow  stuck  in  the  ground,"  worshipping  it  as 
"the  center  of  their  existence"  ;*  we  may  revolt  at  the 
horrible  mutilations,  tortures  and  human  sacrifices 
which  were  inflicted  by  the  ancient  Germans,  and  were 
more  or  less  common  to  the  early  history  of  "even  the 
noblest  religions" ;  ^  and  we  of  a  quiet,  thoughtful, 
spiritual  faith  may  turn  away  with  relief  from  the 
elaborate  ritualism  of  a  sacerdotal  type  of  Christian- 

*  Dr.  Brinton,  work  quoted,  p.  39. 

*  Prof.  George  B.  Foster,  "The  Function  of  Religion,"  p.  112. 
"  Dr.  Brinton,  pp.  188,  189. 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION  21 

ity :  but  we  must  recognize  that  all  these  various  forms 
of  worship  have  sprung  from  some  root  of  sincerity  in 
the  human  soul,  and  have  subsisted  by  virtue  of  the 
general  state  of  culture  (or  lack  of  culture)  in  which 
they  have  found  their  setting.  Conscious  deception, 
fraud,  chicanery,  imposition  may  have  occasionally 
played  some  small  part  in  the  religious  history  of 
mankind ;  but  this  Is  as  nothing  in  comparison  with 
the  great  spirit  of  sincerity,  whether  ignorant  or  en- 
lightened, which  has  pervaded  all  ranks  of  religious 
society,  from  the  lowest  to  the  highest,  either  in  an- 
cient or  in  modern  times. 

These  facts  may  serve  to  show  that  there  is  no 
single  idea,  belief,  doctrine,  ceremony  or  custom  which 
is  absolutely  universal  in  religion,  or  which  in  itself 
is  essential  to  its  nature.  To  quote  again  from  Dr. 
Brinton: 

"There  is  no  one  belief  or  set  of  beliefs  which  con- 
stitutes a  religion.  We  are  apt  to  suppose  that  every 
creed  must  teach  a  belief  in  a  god  or  gods,  in  an 
immortal  soul,  and  in  a  divine  government  of  the  world. 
.  .  .  No  mistake  could  be  greater.  The  religion  which 
to-day  counts  the  largest  number  of  adherents.  Bud- 
dhism, rejects  every  one  of  these  items.  .  .  .  Some 
(religions)  believe  in  souls,  but  not  in  gods;  while  a 
divine  government  is  a  thought  rarely  present  in  sav- 
age minds.  They  do  not,  as  a  rule,  recognize  any 
such  principle  as  that  of  good  and  evil,  or  any  doctrine 
of  rewards  and  punishment  hereafter  for  conduct  in 
the  present  life.  .  .  .  There  is,  in  fact,  not  any  one 
item  in  any  creed  which  is  accepted  by  all  religions."  ^ 

In  what,  then,  does  the  essence  of  religion  consist? 
Let  us  see  whether  a  few  leading  definitions  of  religion 
» "Religions  of  Primitive  Peoples,"  pp.  28,  29. 


22  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

may  throw  any  light  upon  this  question. 

Almost  the  only  definition  of  religion  given  in  the 
Bible  is  that  of  St.  James,  who  says :  "Pure  religion 
and  undefiled  before  our  God  and  Father  is  this,  to 
visit  the  fatherless  and  widows  in  their  affliction,  and 
to  keep  himself  unspotted  from  the  world."  ^ 

Other  great  thinkers  have  given  the  following  defini- 
tions, as  they  are  collated  and  quoted  by  Mr.  Benja- 
min Kidd.^ 

"Seneca. — To  know  God  and  imitate  Him. 

"Kant. — Religion  consists  in  recognizing  all  our  du- 
ties as  Divine  commands. 

"Matthew  Arnold. — Religion  is  morality  touched  by 
emotion. 

"Hegel. — The  knowledge  acquired  by  the  Finite 
Spirit  of  its  essence  as  an  Absolute  Spirit. 

"Hibxley. — Reverence  and  love  for  the  Ethical  Ideal, 
and  the  desire  to  realize  that  ideal  in  life. 

"Froude. — A  sense  of  responsibility  to  the  Power 
that  made  us. 

"Mill. — The  essence  of  Religion  is  the  strong  and 
earnest  direction  of  the  emotions  and  desires  towards 
an  ideal  object,  recognized  as  the  highest  excellence, 
and  as  rightly  paramount  over  all  selfish  objects  of 
desire. 

"Carlyle, — The  thing  a  man  does  practically  be- 
lieve ;  the  thing  a  man  does  practically  lay  to  heart, 
and  know  for  certain,  concerning  his  vital  relations  to 
this  mysterious  universe  and  his  duty  and  destiny 
therein. 

"Dr.  Martineau. — Religion  is  a  belief  in  an  ever- 
lasting God ;  that  is,  a  Divine  mind  and  will,  ruling  the 

^St.  James  i.27. 

« "Social  Evolution,"  pp.  89,  90. 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION  23 

Universe,  and  holding  moral  relations  with  mankind." 

Farther  on  Mr.  Kidd  himself  says:  "A  religion  is 
a  form  of  belief,  providing  an  ultra-rational  sanction 
for  that  large  class  of  conduct  in  the  individual  where 
his  interests  and  the  interests  of  the  social  organism 
are  antagonistic,  and  by  which  the  former  are  rendered 
subordinate  to  the  latter  in  the  general  interests  of 
the  evolution  which  the  race  is  undergoing."  ^ 

The  Century  Dictionary  defines  religion  as  "recogni- 
tion of  and  allegiance  in  manner  of  life  to  a  super- 
human power  or  super-human  powers,  to  whom  al- 
legiance and  service  are  regarded  as  justly  due." 

Schleiermacher  taught  that  "religion  is  neither  meta- 
physics nor  morality,  but  arises  at  the  moment  that 
we  become  conscious  of  a  contact  between  ourselves  and 
the  universe,"  this  contact  being  a  profound  "feeling 
of  dependence." 

Max  Mueller  in  his  "Hibbert  Lectures"  defined  re- 
ligion as  "a  mental  faculty  which  independent  of,  nay, 
in  spite,  of  sense  and  reason,  enables  man  to  appre- 
hend the  infinite  under  different  names  and  under  vary- 
ing disguises" ;  and  he  said,  "We  can  hear  in  all  re- 
ligions a  groaning  of  the  spirit,  a  struggle  to  conceive 
the  inconceivable,  to  utter  the  unutterable,  a  longing 
after  the  Infinite,  a  love  of  God."  ^^ 

Finally,  Professor  Jastrow  himself  concludes  a  valu- 
able study  of  the  subject  by  saying  that  "religion  may 
be  defined  as  the  natural  belief  in  a  Power  or  Powers 
beyond  our  control,  and  upon  whom  we  feel  ourselves 
dependent;  which  belief  and  feeling  of  dependence 
prompt  (1)  to  organization,  (2)  to  specific  acts,  and 


s  »c 


"Social  Evolution,"  p.  103. 
^"Quoted   bv   Prof.    Morris   Jastrow,   Jun.,  in   "The   Study   of 
Religion"   (1901),  p.  163. 


M  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

(3)  to  the  regulation  of  conduct,  with  a  view  to  estab- 
lishing favorable  relations  between  ourselves  and  the 
Power  or  Powers  in  question."  ^^ 

Perhaps  these  various  definitions  do  not  greatly  help 
us — mere  definitions  of  any  matter  seldom  do ;  but  they 
may  serve  to  bring  out  a  little  more  clearly  the  truth 
which  has  been  slowly  emerging  all  along,  namely:  that 
the  nature  of  religion  is  to  be  sought,  not  in  external 
forms,  but  in  the  inner  workings  of  the  human  mind; 
and  that  its  essence  consists  in  an  instinctive  feeling 
after  the  Divine,  an  instinctive  apprehension  of  the  Di- 
vine, an  instinctive  hunger  for  the  Divine,  an  instinc- 
tive tendency  to  postulate  a  Deity.  The  religiousness 
of  man  is  universal;  the  investigations  of  the  scholars 
may  be  said  to  have  established  this  fact  beyond  perad- 
venture.^^  But  the  fact  of  such  universality  is  the 
most  conclusive  proof  imaginable  that  religion  is  per- 
fectly natural  to  man.  This  means  that  all  religions 
spring  from  the  same  root  in  the  human  soul;  that  this 
root  is  an  inalienable  instinct  implanted  in  man,  not  by 
any  second  birth,  but  by  his  original  birth  as  a  spiritual 
being;  and  that  this  instinct  is  one  of  the  strongest  im- 
pulses or  forces  that  have  animated  the  race,  control- 
ling conduct  in  all  ages  as  few  other  influences  have 
been  able  to  do.  Let  a  final  quotation  from  Dr.  Brin- 
ton  confirm  this  truth, — "The  religiosity  of  man  is  a 
part  of  his  psychical  being.  In  the  nature  and  laws 
of  the  human  mind,  in  its  intellect,  sympathies,  emo- 
tions, and  passions,  lie  the  well-springs  of  all  religions, 
modern  or  ancient.  Christian  or  heathen.     To  these  we 

"  Work  cited,  pp.  171,  172. 

^^Dr.  Brinton:  "The  fact  is  that  there  has  not  been  a  single 
tribe,  no  matter  how  rude,  known  in  history  or  visited  by  travelers, 
which  has  been  shown  to  be  destitute  of  religion,  under  some 
form."    Work  cited,  p.  30;  also  p.  33. 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION,  25 

must  refer,  by  these  we  must  explain,  whatever  errors, 
falsehoods,  bigotry  or  cruelty  have  stained  man's  creeds 
and  cults ;  to  them  we  must  credit  whatever  truth, 
beauty,  piety,  and  love  have  hallowed  and  glorified  his 
long  search  for  the  perfect  and  the  eternal."  ^^ 

Here,  then,  we  find  the  central,  essential,  substantial 
fact  or  truth  which  we  have  been  seeking.  The  great 
reality  in  religion  is  the  universality,  naturalness  and 
permanence  of  the  religious  instinct  or  impulse  m  the 
human  soul.  In  one  word  we  may  call  it  aspiration; 
or  it  may  be  called  hunger,  the  hunger  of  the  soul  for 
God, — as  natural  and,  in  its  way,  as  potent  as  the  hun- 
ger of  the  body  for  food,  or  the  hunger  of  the  mind  for 
truth,  or  the  hunger  of  the  heart  for  love.  Back  of 
all  rites  and  ceremonies  and  institutions,  beneath  all 
crudities  and  errors,  within  all  refinements  of  culture 
there  exists  and  persists  this  native  tendency  of  the 
human  spirit  to  conceive  the  Divine  and  to  seek  some 
sort  of  relation  thereto  or  communion  therewith.  All 
outward  forms  of  expression  may  change,  but  this  in- 
ner impulse  abides,  with  whatever  of  indestructibility 
and  promise  the  personality  of  such  a  being  as  man  is 
may  itself  possess. 

Whence  came  this  religious  instinct,  this  hungering 
and  groping  after  the  Divine,  we  can  no  more  tell  than 
we  can  tell  the  ultimate  origin  of  human  nature.  Biol- 
ogy, psychology  and  philosophy  may  throw  light  upon 
the  manner  of  its  development,  but  these  partial,  tenta- 
tive explanations  serve  quite  as  much  to  deepen  as  to 
remove  the  mystery  of  our  being, — the  mystery,  won- 
der and  glory  of  human  life  in  what  we  may  perhaps 
call,  more  justifiably  now  than  ever  before,  a  living 
universe.  We  know  at  least  that  we  are  here;  we  are 
"  "Religions  of  Primitive  Peoples,"  pp.  29,  30. 


S6  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

conscious  of  our  spiritual  aptitudes ;  and,  so  far  as  we 
can  see,  our  religious  instinct  is  as  natural  as  our 
power  of  thought,  our  moral  sense  or  our  affectionate 
disposition.  Thus  religion  becomes  a  great,  spiritual 
dynamic  in  our  human  world, — as  real  and,  within  its 
own  sphere,  as  effective  as  the  force  we  call  gravity  in 
the  material  realm ;  indeed  it  might  not  be  inapt  to  call 
religion  a  kind  of  spiritual  gravitation,  binding  the 
finite  soul  of  man  to  the  Infinite  Soul  of  the  universe 
as  a  planet  is  bound  to  its  central  sun. 

Now  from  this  point  of  view,  looking  out  upon  the 
religious  life  of  mankind,  which  is  as  variegated  as  the 
flora  and  fauna  of  different  climes,  and  trying  to  in- 
terpret it  all  in  the  light  of  what  is  deepest,  purest  and 
highest  in  ourselves,  we  may  note  a  few  profoundly  en- 
couraging facts. 

1.  We  see  the  remarkable  power  and  fruitfulness  of 
the  religious  instinct.  It  moves  individuals,  classes  and 
masses ;  it  sways  the  most  backward  peoples  and  the 
most  advanced,  savage  tribes  and  civilized  communities ; 
it  prompts  to  acts  of  devotion  and  sacrifice  that  spring 
out  of  fear  or  credulity  as  well  as  out  of  reverence, 
gratitude  and  love ;  it  inspires  deeds  of  fanaticism  and 
deeds  of  heroism;  it  sends  men  on  pilgrimages  and  into 
wars ;  it  enlists  them  in  hateful  persecutions  and  in 
splendid  philanthropies ;  it  even  leads,  as  it  led  in  New 
England,  to  the  founding  of  States  and  may  be  the 
principal  factor  in  shaping  their  development.  What 
shrines  it  has  established,  what  altars  it  has  raised, 
what  monuments  it  has  reared,  what  temples  it  has 
erected,  what  magnificent  cathedrals  it  has  builded 
against  the  sky,  to  bear  witness  to  man's  haunting  sense 
of  the  unseen  and  the  eternal !    What  sacred  literatures 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION  27 

it  has  produced,  what  beautiful  painting  and  sculpture 
and  music,  as  its  holy  spirit  has  touched  with  creative 
influence  the  genius  of  earth's  most  gifted  sons !  Above 
all,  how  many  sweet,  strong,  saintly  human  lives  it  has 
fashioned,  sustaining  and  guiding  them  through  the 
trials  of  this  world,  making  them  conscious  of  the  Di- 
vine Presence  and  Power  as  neither  learning  nor  art 
could  do,  and  sending  them  hence  with  their  spirits 
radiant  with  the  light  of  immortal  faith,  hope  and  love ! 
What  other  force  in  our  human  sphere  has  been  one- 
half  so  potent  and  fruitful? 

We  must  guard  against  limiting  our  estimate  of  the 
power  and  scope  of  religion  by  our  own  personal  ex- 
perience. We  ourselves  may  not  have  felt  very  greatly 
its  quickening  influence ;  we  ourselves  may  never  have 
drunk  very  deeply  from  the  well-springs  of  spirituality : 
but  this  is  no  adequate  reason  for  denying  that  other 
men,  with  diff^erent  thoughts  and  struggles  and  rela- 
tionships, have  seen  and  felt  and  proved  many  things 
which  we  have  never  learned.  When  one  reads  a  vol- 
ume like  the  late  Professor  William  James's,  "The  Va- 
rieties of  Religious  Experience,"  or  books  like  Harold 
Begbie's  "Twice  Born  Men,"  etc.,  or  studies  the  life- 
work  of  such  a  man  as  the  late  General  William  Booth, 
the  founder  of  the  Salvation  Army,  or  peruses  the 
confessional  literature  of  saints  and  mystics,  one  quickly 
perceives  that  there  have  been  hosts  of  people  in  whom 
religion  has  been  the  one  all-dominating  force,  the  one 
profound,  vital  and  enriching  experience,  the  one  open 
way  to  an  absolute  victory  of  the  soul  in  a  world  of 
tumult  and  conflict.  The  attainments  of  such  people 
bear  witness  to  spiritual  realities  of  which  the  rest  of 
us  only  obtain  occasional  glimpses,  and  may  well  remind 
us  that  "there  are  more  things  in  heaven  and  earth  than 


28  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

are  dreamed  of  in"  any  man's  "philosophy." 

2.  We  see  the  inner  or  underlying  unity,  amid  all 
diversities,  of  the  religious  spirit  of  the  race.  Super- 
ficially, indeed,  nothing  seems  to  divide  men  more 
sharply  than  do  their  differences  in  matters  of  religion ; 
and  yet  these  relate  chiefly  to  externalities, — to  doc- 
trines, creeds,  rites,  ceremonies,  institutions,  forms  of 
organization,  methods  of  work,  social  customs,  habits, 
etc.,  etc. ;  and  beneath  all  such  there  is  a  common  hu- 
man heart-hunger,  a  yearning,  an  aspiration,  a  sense 
of  need,  together  with  the  hope  of  its  divine  satisfaction, 
which  makes  the  whole  world  kin.  It  was  a  word  of 
deep  insight  which  St.  Paul  spoke  to  the  men  of  Athens 
when  he  declared  unto  them  the  invisible  God  whom 
they  had  unwittingly  worshiped,  and  said  that  He  had 
"made  of  one  every  nation  of  men  to  dwell  on  all  the 
face  of  the  earth,  having  determined  their  appointed 
seasons,  and  the  bounds  of  their  habitation ;  that  they 
should  seek  God,  if  haply  they  might  feel  after  him 
and  find  him."  If  there  is  "one  God  and  Father  of  all, 
who  is  over  all  and  through  all  and  in  all,"  the  spiritual 
unity  of  the  human  race  is  its  most  vital  and  profound 
unity;  and  the  fact  that  we  are  understanding  this 
better  to-day  than  ever  before,  more  scientifically  and 
also  more  sympathetically,  affords  the  highest  ground 
of  hope — one  might  almost  say  the  only  ground  of  hope 
— for  a  growing  sense  of  universal  human  brotherhood. 
If  in  the  immediate  future  our  own  form  of  religion 
can  help  mankind  to  realize  a  larger  measure  of  this 
"unity  of  the  spirit  in  the  bond  of  peace,"  and  can  thus 
promote  the  further  growth  of  this  sense  of  universal 
brotherhood,  it  will  prove  anew  its  power  to  mold  life 
and  to  serve  effectually  the  highest  interests  of  the  race. 
3r  We  see,  moreover,  the  evolutionary  progress  of 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION  29 

religion  through  the  ages,  and  learn  to  judge  of  its 
various  forms  or  types  or  products  in  the  light  of  the 
stages  of  culture  to  which  they  belong.  Since  the  idea 
of  development  has  entered  into  modern  thought  so 
fully  as  to  reconstruct  the  entire  reading  of  human  his- 
tory, we  have  been  learning  that  the  principle  applies 
to  spiritual  things  as  well  as  to  physical.  Hence  we 
now  conceive  that  religion  itself  is  a  phase  of  man's 
development,  although  it  is  impossible  to  tell  at  what 
point  it  first  appears  along  the  upward  pathway  on 
which  he  has  slowly  climbed  from  the  orders  of  life 
below  him.  If  we  bear  in  mind  that  development  in 
this,  as  in  other  respects,  is  not  all  one  way, — that  there 
are  often  lapses,  declines,  retrogressions  ;  in  other  words, 
that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  degeneration  in  the  spir- 
itual as  well  as  the  physical  life  of  man, — if  we  take 
due  account  of  this  fact,  and  so  correct  our  easy  gen- 
eralizations, we  may  still  properly  say  that,  viewed 
as  a  whole,  religion  has  undergone  a  vast  development 
in  passing  from  its  lowest  to  its  highest  stages.  In- 
stantly, however,  we  must  remind  ourselves  that  there 
are  still  in  existence,  among  the  different  tribes  and 
races,  all  the  various  degrees  of  advancement,  from  the 
crudest  to  the  most  refined,  which  we  suppose  to  have 
been  covered  in  the  case  of  any  given  highly-developed 
type  of  religion.  So  there  is  no  single  universal  re- 
ligion yet;  whether  any  extant  religion  is  capable  of 
becoming  universal  is  another  question.^* 

"Dr.  George  Galloway  in  his  recent  volume  in  the  International 
Theological  Library  series,  entitled  "The  Philosophy  of  Religion" 
(Scribner's,  1914),  points  out  that  there  have  been  three  main 
stages  in  the  development  of  religion,  so  far  as  we  know  enough 
about  it  historically  to  judge.  "The  first  and  earliest  known  to  us 
Is  Spiritism,  the  primitive  form  of  belief  out  of  which  all  higher 
religion  has  grown.  Then  follows  Polytheism,  the  religion  of  the 
nation  in   contrast  to  the  tribe:   a  stage  of  religion  which  was 


so  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

Now  while  it  is  evident  that  any  particular  type  of 
religion  can  be  fairly  judged  only  in  the  light  of  the 
conditions  under  which  it  appears,  the  state  of  back- 
wardness or  advancement  in  culture  which  forms  its 
matrix,  so  to  speak,  we  must  remember  that  the  true 
nature  of  essential  religion  is  to  be  found  upon  its 
highest  levels  rather  than  upon  its  lowest.  It  is  a 
mistake  to  suppose  that  we  shall  best  understand  the 
real  character  of  religion  by  observing  it,  or  reading 
about  it  as  others  have  observed  it,  among  savages  or 
semi-civilized  peoples.  Not  so  do  we  judge  of  art  or 
science  or  family  life  or  human  government.  A  tree 
is  known  by  its  fruits  rather  than  by  its  roots.  If 
we  want  to  understand  the  full  meaning  of  religion, 
its  most  vital  power  and  its  greatest  blessedness,  let 
us  seek  it  among  the  noblest  and  wisest,  the  sanest  and 
purest  men  and  women.  Other  things,  indeed,  will  have 
helped  to  make  them  noble  and  wise,  sane  and  pure; 
but  when  religion  is  developed  and  refined  to  such  a 
degree  of  spiritual  perfection  as  to  blend  with  all  these 
other  influences  and  to  find  a  fit  abode  in  such  worthy 
souls, — yea,  even  to  be,  itself,  the  principal  factor  in 
making   them   what   they   have   become, — we   may    see 

reached  on  the  formation  of  the  larger  national  States  some  time 
before  the  clear  light  of  history.  Finally  comes  Monotheism,  a 
spiritual  faith  which  goes  beyond  the  limits  of  the  nation,  and,  in 
its  Christian  form,  out  of  the  dissolution  of  the  national  States 
of  the  old  world  has  become  a  Universal  Religion.  .  .  .  These 
three  stages  of  religion  mark  an  ascending  scale  of  life,  and 
therefore  of  human  needs  and  of  the  objects  which  satisfy  these 
needs.  A  gradual  purification  and  refinement  of  religious  values 
are  visible.  The  development  is  from  the  sensuous  to  the  spiritual, 
from  the  desire  of  outward  things  to  the  consciousness  that  the 
highest  goods  are  the  goods  of  the  soul.  Hence,  underlying  the 
evolution  of  religion  and  working  through  it,  is  the  growth  of 
self-consciousness,  the  personal  development  of  man." — Pp.  242, 
243. 


GREAT  REALITY  IN  RELIGION  31 

most  clearly  its  true  nature  and  worth. 

In  the  light  of  this  thought  it  is  gratifying  and  in- 
spiring to  know  that  religion  among  ourselves  is  at 
present  rising  to  a  higher  level.  It  is  steadily  purify- 
ing itself  from  superstitions  and'  errors  in  thought; 
it  is  becoming  more  enlightened,  nor  yet  less  reverent; 
it  is  becoming  infused  with  the  ethical  and  philanthropic 
spirit,  so  that  a  veritable  passion  for  social  betterment 
is  everywhere  possessing  it;  and  it  is  reaching  out  to 
the  uttermost  ends  of  the  earth,  and  to  the  lowliest  and 
neediest  of  all  lands,  with  its  proffer  of  truth  and 
love ;  yea,  it  even  embraces  in  the  scope  of  its  faith  and 
hope  and  promise  of  redemption  the  whole  family  of 
mankind  "in  heaven  and  on  earth."  In  other  words, 
religion  in  our  time  is  coming  to  be  rationalized,  moral- 
ized, spiritualized  and  vitalized;  and  thereby  it  holds 
out  the  promise  and  potency  of  a  better  Hfe  for  our 
world,  to  be  slowly  but  surely  won  in  the  ages  to  come. 

4.  Finally,  we  may  be  perfectly  confident  that  the 
future  will  have  its  religion.  It  may  not  be  exactly 
hke  any  type  of  religion  which  has  prevailed  in  the 
past;  but  the  instinct  will  not  die  out  of  the  human 
heart  which  prompts  man  to  aspire  and  yearn,  which 
makes  him  feel  the  solemn  mystery  and  wonder  of  ex- 
istence, which  creates  within  him  a  hunger  for  truth 
and  goodness  and  love  and  holiness,  and  which  impels 
him  to  seek  some  sort  of  communion  with  the  Unseen 
Power  that  enfolds  and  interpenetrates  his  own  life  and 
that  he  has  learned  to  call  the  Living  God.  Ideas  and 
doctrines  may  change,  as  learning  and  experience  may 
modify  them ;  so  may  rites  and  ceremonies,  social  cus- 
toms and  institutions:  but  the  inner,  underlying  spirit 
which  makes  us  all  at  least  dimly  aware  that  we  have 
spiritual  aptitudes  and  sustain  spiritual  relations,  and 


32  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

thus  awakens  within  us  a  feeble  or  a  vivid  consciousness 
of  our  kinship  with  the  Eternal  Spirit — "the  Spirit 
itself  beareth  witness  with  our  spirit  that  we  are  chil- 
dren of  God,"  ^^ — this  is  as  imperishable  as  the  human 
personality  of  which  it  is  a  part. 

"I  think  man's  soul  dwells  nearer  to  the  east, 
Nearer  to  morning's  fountains  than  the  sun; 
Herself  the  source  whence  all  tradition  sprang, 
Herself  at  once  both  labyrinth  and  clew. 
^     The  miracle  fades  out  of  history, 

But  faith  and  wonder  and  the  primal  earth 
Are  born  into  the  world  with  every  child."  " 

"Rom.  viii:16. 

'» Lowell,  The  Cathedral. 


II 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH  T 

OUR  study  thus  far  has  shown  that  religion  in 
its  vital  essence  is  instinctive,  universal  and 
very  potent  in  the  life  of  mankind ;  that  there- 
fore we  may  rightly  hold  it  to  be  as  natural  as  love  or 
reason  or  the  moral  apprehension ;  and  that  it  thus 
becomes  a  living  dynamic,  as  real  and  significant  in  the 
spiritual  realm  as  is  gravity  or  electricity  in  the  ma- 
terial. 

If  these  conclusions  are  thoroughly  tenable,  they 
carry  a  couple  of  corollaries  which  deserve  a  moment's 
attention. 

1.  The  basis  of  all  religious  inquiry  must  be  human 
nature.  Formerly  it  was  customary  to  begin  a  discus- 
sion of  religious  matters  by  considering  the  teachings 
of  the  Bible  and  the  attributes  of  God.  But  of  course 
this  method  of  reasoning  assumes  the  existence  of  God 
and  the  truthfulness,  somehow,  of  the  teachings  of  the 
Bible;  whereas  we  no  longer  tliink  it  warrantable  to 
take  these  important  postulates  for  granted,  but  must 
first  find  support  for  them  in  the  depths  of  human  na- 
ture, the  one  field  which  yields  us  our  most  immediate 
and  sure  knowledge.  Indeed  it  is  our  thought  that 
man  himself  is  the  chief  revelation  of  whatever  spiritual 
significance  the  universe  affords ;  humanity  is  the  prin- 
cipal interpreter  of  Deity ;  out  of  the  profound  experi- 
ences of  human  life  all  sacred  scriptures  are  born,  how- 

33 


34  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

ever  inspired  by  the  over-brooding  and  indwelling  Spirit. 
Hence  the  care  and  thoroughness  with  which  we  must 
ever  prosecute  the  study  of  human  nature,  and  the 
reverence  with  which  we  should  listen  to  every  mes- 
sage that  comes  from  the  inmost  recesses  of  man's 
soul. 

2.  We  must  always  distinguish  between  religion  and 
its  manifold  products.  Religion  itself  is  simply  the 
instinctive  attitude  of  the  soul  which  impels  to  wor- 
ship, consists  essentially  of  aspiration,  apprehends  or 
suggests  the  Divine,  and,  in  its  higher  stages,  yearns 
for  communion  with  the  living  God;  while  its  products 
are  the  various  forms  in  which  it  expresses  itself, — 
rites,  ceremonies,  postures,  penances,  prayers,  pilgrim- 
ages, altars,  shrines,  temples  and  creeds.  These  differ 
in  different  countries,  ages  and  degrees  of  culture;  but 
the  underlying  spirit  common  to  them  all  is  ever  the 
same. 

This  distinction  will  lead  us  to  separate  sharply  be- 
tween religion  and  theology,  which  is  merely  thoughts 
about  religion.  Rehgion  is  the  spiritual  life  of  the 
soul;  while  theology  is  the  intellectual  theory  of  that 
life,  its  philosophical  explanation,  the  orderly  account 
of  its  relation  to  God  and  of  God's  government  of 
the  world.  Of  course  there  is  a  certain  close  connection 
between  the  two,  especially  among  intelligent  people; 
for  it  is  inevitable  that  a  rational  being  should  reflect 
somewhat  upon  his  emotions,  desires  and  struggles,  and 
thus  come  to  intellectual  theories  or  conclusions  regard- 
ing them.  Yet  it  is  possible  for  religion  to  subsist  and 
to  be  very  pure,  strong  and  fruitful  without  any  formal 
theology  at  all, — ^just  as  it  is  possible  for  a  man  to 
be  morally  upright  without  having  thought  out  any 
particular  theory  of  ethics;  or  to  love  his  wife  and 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH?     35 

children  deeply  and  tenderly  without  ever  dreaming  of 
any  such  scientific  account  of  the  evolution  of  human 
affection  as  Henry  Drumm.ond  gives  in  his  "Ascent  of 
Man."  The  fact  is  that  throughout  the  most  of  Chris- 
tian history,  especially  since  the  days  of  Medieval 
Scholasticism,  and  still  more  especially — in  Protestant 
circles — since  the  rise  of  Calvinism  and  the  reactions 
against  it,  the  theological  note  has  been  so  strong  as 
to  dominate  the  more  vital,  spiritual  interests  of  re- 
ligion; whence  it  has  come  to  pass  that  multitudes 
have  identified  religion  with  theology, — a  true,  pure, 
reverent,  aspiring  spirit  in  the  heart  with  a  supposedly 
correct  intellectual  conception  or  philosophy  of  the 
Divine  nature  and  procedure;  whence,  unfortunately, 
it  has  still  further  transpired  that,  when  a  given 
theological  system — like  Calvinism — has  broken  down, 
people  have  inferred  that  religion  was  ruined.  All 
such  mistakes  may  be  avoided  by  remembering  that 
religion  in  its  primary  essence  is  an  instinctive  hunger 
for  God,  while  theology  is  merely  an  intellectual  theory 
about  God.  Hence  it  follows  that  real,  spiritual  re- 
ligion may  be  nourished  in  the  souls  of  the  people  even 
though  all  our  established  intellectual  formularies  go 
to  pieces. 

Now  we  come  to  inquire  as  to  the  nature,  function 
and  scope  of  faith,  a  term  which  has  always  occupied 
a  large  place  in  Christian  phraseology.  Just  what  is 
faith,  and  what  has  it  to  do  with  religion,  and  how 
may  the  noblest  faith  be  gained.?  A  sound  answer  to 
these  questions  will  go  a  long  way  toward  simplifying 
some   of   our  most  perplexing  religious   problems. 

The  word  faith  is  synonymous  with  the  word  belief, 
the  one  coming  to  us   from  the  Latin  and  the  other 


36  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

from  the  Anglo-Saxon.  Each  denotes  primarily  the 
assent  of  the  mind  to  a  proposition,  statement  or 
thought  which  it  has  not  absolutely  demonstrated. 
Such  assent  may  be  the  conclusion  of  definite  processes 
of  reasoning,  every  step  of  which  may  be  traced;  or 
it  may  be  partly  this  and  partly  also  the  result  of 
feelings,  tendencies  and  vague  intimations  that  are  not 
entirely  susceptible  of  being  logically  formulated. 
In  any  case  one's  faith  or  belief  must  rest  upon  some 
evidence  and  involve  judgment;  else  it  is  mere  credulity, 
which  is  the  foundation  of  superstition  and  fanaticism : 
and  the  higher  the  order  of  mind  that  entertains  it — 
or  perhaps  it  were  better  to  say  the  more  logical  that 
order- — the  more  nearly  perfect  will  be  its  action  in 
accordance  with  the  evidence.  A  trained,  experienced 
and  honorable  jurist  becomes  almost  a  machine  for 
weighing  evidence  and  turning  out  decisions  in  har- 
mony therewith;  but  the  vast  majority  of  people  are 
so  little  disciplined  in  this  respect  that  their  beliefs 
are  largely  a  jumble  of  a  few  reasons  and  many 
prejudices,  involving  all  sorts  of  piques,  crotchets  and 
guesses ;  indeed  it  may  be  said  that  popular  beliefs 
generally — touching  the  weather,  the  war,  politics,  re- 
ligion, what  not — consist  mainly  of  mere  floating  ideas 
or  sayings,  current  at  the  time,  absorbed  from  sur- 
roundings, or  inherited  from  the  past,  near  or  re- 
mote. 

It  is  clear,  then,  that  faith  or  belief  may  be  of  every 
conceivable  degree  of  strength  or  weakness.  You 
believe  the  sun  will  rise  to-morrow  morning — or  will 
appear  to  do  so — and  nothing  could  shake  your  con- 
fidence; you  would  risk  your  life  upon  it  without  hesi- 
tation. But  you  may  believe  that  we  are  going  to  have 
a  fruitful  summer  or  a  severe  winter;  yet  how  much 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH?     37 

would  you  risk  upon  that  proposition?  You  believe 
that  your  partner  in  business,  whom  you  have  known 
intimately  for  many  years,  is  strictly  reliable,  and 
nothing  short  of  overwhelming  proof  would  change  your 
mind ;  but  the  plausible  stranger  who  comes  to  solicit 
your  investment  in  a  gold  mine  cannot  command  any 
such  confidence.  The  fact  is,  we  use  the  word  faith 
or  the  word  belief  to  cover  every  shade  of  conviction 
of  which  the  mind  may  be  conscious,  from  the  feeblest 
to  the  strongest;  and  each  particular  form  or  instance 
of  faith  or  belief  must  stand  upon  its  own  basis, 
whether  the  reasons  for  it  can  be  fully  stated  or  not. 
We  may  believe  with  the  utmost  assurance  that  Jesus 
Christ  lived  in  Palestine,  nineteen  hundred  years  ago, 
and  was  an  exalted  Teacher  of  spiritual  truth,  because 
the  evidence  is  sufficient  to  produce  such  a  conviction 
in  our  minds.  But  we  may  seriously  doubt  whether  he 
actually  walked  upon  the  sea,  or  turned  water  into 
wine,  or  raised  the  dead,  simply  because  the  evidence 
for  these  alleged  occurrences  is  not  adequate,  in  the 
face  of  the  established  order  of  Nature,  to  completely 
convince  us  of  them.  Each  case,  each  item  or  article 
in  a  man's  faith,  must  rest  upon  its  own  evidential 
ground,  must  stand  or  fall  by  itself  mainly. 

But  religious  faith,  in  which  we  are  especially  in- 
terested, is,  when  genuine  and  powerful,  something 
more  than  a  surface  opinion.  It  reaches  into  the 
depths  of  a  man's  soul,  or  it  springs  out  of  his  deepest 
experiences,  and  it  subsists  not  only  by  virtue  of  rea- 
sons but  also  by  virtue  of  emotions  or  insights  or  ap- 
prehensions which  cannot  be  set  forth  in  logical  array. 
In  other  words,  life  is  more  than  logic,  more  than  in- 
tellect; and  faith,  religious  faith  peculiarly,  is  an 
expression  of  life,  an  attitude  of  one's  whole  being. 


38  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

Just  as  the  psychologists  are  teaching  us  that  a  large 
part  of  our  mentality  lies  below  or  beyond  the  com- 
paratively narrow  field  of  our  immediate  and  clear 
consciousness,  and  that  a  great  deal  of  our  real  life 
goes  on  in  this  so-called  subliminal  or  subconscious  or 
extra-conscious  realm — the  realm  which  still  holds  our 
half-forgotten  knowledge,  and  keeps  faithful  record  of 
many  of  our  wholly  forgotten  deeds ; — so  it  may  be 
said  that  the  forces  which  contribute  to  a  man's  pro- 
found spiritual  faith  lie  out  of  sight,  under  ground, 
like  the  roots  of  a  flowering  and  fruitful  plant;  and 
he  may  never  be  able  to  explain  his  faith  entirely  by 
giving  precise  answers  to  categorical  questions.  If  a 
good  man  were  asked  why  he  believes  in  his  good  wife, 
in  her  purity,  honesty,  unselfishness  and  love,  he  would 
not  be  able  to  tell  why  with  absolute  exactness  and 
completeness :  he  believes  in  her  because  he  knows  her 
and  loves  her,  indeed,  but  also  because  of  a  subtle 
union  subsisting  between  them  which  is  as  indefinable 
or  inexplicable  as  it  is  indissoluble — it  is  a  thing  of 
life  and  not  of  theory.  So,  too,  a  man's  religious  faith, 
when  vital  and  potent,  is  derived  from  sources  other 
and  deeper  than  the  processes  of  measuring  and  weigh- 
ing evidence,  however  largely  these  must  figure  in  its 
formulation;  it  is  a  thing  of  life  and  not  of  theory 
only.      More  will  be  said  later  regarding  this   truth. 

Now  the  office  of  faith  is  to  take  the  place  of  knowl- 
edge where  knowledge  is  not  possible,  especially  in 
the  interest  of  action. 

Strictly  speaking,  the  term  knowledge  is  of  very 
limited  import:  it  applies  only  to  those  things  of  which 
we  are  positively  certain;  and  these  are  of  two  classes, 
— the  things  outside  of  us  which  we  apprehend  by 
sense-perception,    and    the   things    which    transpire   in 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH?     39 

the  mind  itself,  of  which  we  are  conscious,  namely:  our 
thoughts,  feelings,  purposes,  mental  perceptions,  con- 
victions, aspirations,  hopes.  Of  the  former,  the  things 
without  of  which  our  senses  tell  us,  how  little  we  posi- 
tively know!  We  see  the  moon,  for  instance:  but  what 
does  the  mere  sight  of  that  bright  orb  reveal  to  us  that 
we  can  call  sure  knowledge?  Only  its  brightness  and 
roundness  and  changing  phases.  We  walk  through 
the  fields  and  see  the  flowers,  or  through  the  woods 
and  note  a  variety  of  trees,  or  through  the  mountains 
and  valleys  and  observe  different  kinds  of  rock:  but 
unless  we  are  botanists  or  horticulturists  or  geolo- 
gists, how  slight  is  the  certain  knowledge  of  those  ob- 
jects which  we  thus  obtain!  Even  when  we  examine 
our  states  of  consciousness,  our  thoughts,  feelings, 
convictions,  desires  and  purposes,  we  find  them  con- 
tinually changing;  and  our  knowledge  of  ourselves 
arising  from  within  ourselves,  and  considered  without 
relation  to  others,  is  exceedingly  small. 

It  is  obvious,  then,  that  the  term  knowledge  must 
be  enlarged  to  include  a  vast  amount  of  information 
that  comes  to  each  of  us  second  hand,  and  in  fact  we 
constantly  employ  it  in  this  way.  When  we  speak  of 
modern  knowledge  in  general,  or  of  any  particular 
branch  of  it,  like  one  of  the  sciences,  we  allude  to  an 
enormous  body  of  fact  and  truth  which  the  learning 
of  the  ages,  especially  of  recent  times,  has  built  up. 
Only  the  merest  fragment  of  this  is  actually  possessed 
by  any  single  mind;  and  with  most  people  half  the 
things  that  are  learned  in  youth  are  forgotten  by 
middle  life.  But  what  we  mean  is  that  this  great 
and  precious  body  of  knowledge  has  been  wrought  out, 
shaped  and  tested ;  that  it  exists  in  books  and  libraries 
and  museums ;  that  it  is  available  to   those  who  are 


40  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

qualified  to  appropriate  it;  and  that  in  this  sense 
it  is  common  property,  the  most  valuable  property 
of  the  world,  some  of  whose  main  features  are  more 
or  less  familiar  to  hosts  of  intelligent  people.  Yet  no 
one  knows  so  well  as  the  profound  scholar  that  even 
the  most  complete  science  of  our  time  is  to  a  con- 
siderable extent  hypothetical;  that  its  conclusions  are 
subject  to  revision  and  re-revision;  and  that  our  age, 
with  all  its  accumulated  riches  of  learning,  has  only 
entered  the  vestibule  of  the  wonderful  temple  of  pos- 
sible knowledge. 

Now  into  all  this  enlarged  conception  of  knowledge 
the  element  of  faith  or  belief  enters  to  a  great  extent. 
It  comes  to  us  mostly  from  others  and  we  take  it  upon 
trust.  All  our  information  concerning  those  parts 
of  the  world  which  we  have  never  seen,  practically  all 
our  historical  knowledge,  and  nine-tenths  of  all  our 
science — astronomy,  geology,  chemistry,  biology, 
medicine,  and  what  not — we  receive  upon  the  testimony 
of  our  fellow  men ;  and  we  believe  it  and  rest  in  it 
and  act  upon  it  because  we  have  confidence  that  they 
know  what  they  are  talking  about.  We  have  never 
seen  the  city  of  Babylon — indeed  ancient  Babylon  van- 
ished long  ago ;  and  we  have  never  read  the  original 
Code  of  Hammurabi — indeed  we  probably  could  not 
read  it  if  we  had  it  before  us ;  yet  we  go  on  teaching 
one  another  about  the  place  of  Babylon  in  history,  and 
about  the  significance  of  that  remarkable  Code  of 
Hammurabi.  Why.''  Because  we  believe  that  the  evi- 
dence concerning  the  city  and  the  Code  has  been  suffi- 
cient to  produce  convictions  amounting  to  practical 
certainty  in  minds  competent  to  judge  of  it.  In  other 
words,  "we  walk  by  faith,  not  by  sight,"  in  these  his- 
torical matters.    We  take  the  testimony  of  others  upon 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH?     41 

trust,  and  they  of  still  others,  and  the  whole  process 
reduces  itself  to  one  of  confidence  in  the  competence 
of  somebody  to  weigh  evidence  and  establish  either 
absolute  proof  or  the  highest  degree  of  probability. 
The  same  thing  is  true  of  nearly  all  our  science.  The 
scholar  in  physics  tells  us  about  the  ether  that  fills 
every  nook  and  corner  and  cranny  of  the  universe, 
even  permeating  the  most  solid  bodies  of  matter;  and 
we  believe  in  its  existence  because  we  believe  in  him,  or 
in  some  other  scholar  who  has  demonstrated  the  theory 
of  its  existence;  and  yet  this  theory  is  only  a  working 
hypothesis,  which  the  scientist  adopts  because  it  most 
completely  solves  the  problems  involved,  and  which 
therefore  has  for  him  so  high  a  degree  of  probability 
as  to  amount  to  practical  certainty.  The  history  of 
science  is  the  record  of  continual  discovery,  hypo- 
thetical explanation,  verification  or  correction,  re- 
statement, and  ever-enlarging  horizons ;  and  at  every 
step  one  mystery  merely  gives  place  to  a  greater 
mystery. 

But  if  such  is  the  character  of  our  historical  and 
scientific  knowledge,  much  more  is  it  the  character  of 
our  practical  judgments  in  the  conduct  of  every-day 
affairs.  We  "know  not  what  shall  be  on  the  morrow" : 
yet  we  marry  and  give  in  marriage,  we  journey  abroad, 
we  engage  in  business,  we  make  investments,  we  plan 
for  the  future,  we  take  risks  of  every  sort,  in  sheer 
faith,  i.  e.,  in  our  belief  that  we  shall  live  and  be  in 
health,  that  safety  and  prosperity  will  attend  us,  that 
our  fellow  men  can  be  depended  upon,  and  that  the 
good  order  of  the  world  will  hold  together;  but  every 
one  of  these  things  is  uncertain.  We  do  not  know  and 
we  cannot  know  what  the  immediate  future  has  in  store 
for  us,  and  much  less  the  remote  future:  yet  we  fare 


42  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

on  bravely  and  cheerfully,  trying  to  know  as  much  as 
possible,  forming  judgments,  weighing  evidence,  esti- 
mating probabilities,  and  "believing  where  we  cannot 
prove" ;  and  most  of  us  achieve  a  reasonable  degree 
of  success,  and  find  our  faith  on  the  whole  justified  by 
results.  Not  always,  alas!  is  it  so  justified.  The  pas- 
sengers who  embarked  on  the  ill-fated  Titanic  un- 
doubtedly did  so  in  faith  that  they  would  have  a  safe 
voyage ;  but  unfortunately  it  proved  otherwise.  Yet 
millions  of  travelers  do  cross  the  ocean  safely,  and 
plan  their  journeys  without  much  fear  in  spite  of  all 
such  terrible  disasters ;  indeed  we  all  go  about  our  daily 
work,  and  shape  our  lives,  and  meet  the  inevitable  un- 
certainties, "in  faith  believing,"  notwithstanding  acci- 
dents, failures,  miscalculations  and  miscarriages.  Only 
so  can  we  live  at  all  in  such  a  world  as  this,  in  which 
we  cannot  know  the  future,  but  in  which  we  must  "walk 
by  faith,  not  by  sight."  We  dwell,  each  of  us,  as 
regards  both  intellectual  and  practical  matters,  within 
a  small  sphere  of  clear  intelligence,  lighted  up  by  a 
little  bit  of  positive  knowledge,  like  a  house  illuminated 
at  night ;  but  outside  is  the  darkness  of  a  vast  igno- 
rance and  uncertainty,  a  realm  of  mystery  that  seems 
to  deepen  as  life  expands.  Into  this  darkness  we  are 
all  striving  to  project  the  rays  of  our  search-lights  a 
little  farther,  each  day,  each  year,  each  generation ; 
but  the  things  we  believe  must  ever  outnumber  the 
things  we  absolutely  know  a  hundred  to  one,  while 
perhaps  the  things  to  be  awaited  must  outnumber  them 
both  still  more  largely. 

"O  world,  thou  choosest  not  the  better  part! 
It  is  not  wisdom  to  be  only  wise, 
And  on  the  inward  vision  close  the  eyes, 

But  it  is  wisdom  to  beheve  the  heart. 

Columbus  found  a  world,  and  had  no  chart. 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH?     43 

Save  one  that  faith  deciphered  in  the  skies; 

To  trust  the  soul's  invincible  surmise 
Was  aU  his  science  and  his  only  art. 
Our  knowledge  is  a  torch  of  smoky  pine 

That  lights  the  pathway  but  one  step  ahead. 

Across   a  void  of  mystery  and  dread. 
Bid,  then,  the  tender  light  of  faith  to  shine, 

By  which  alone  the  mortal  heart  is  led 
Unto  the  thinking  of  the  thought  divine." 

George  Santayaka. 

From  all  this  it  appears  that  faith,  taking  the  place 
of  knowledge  where  knowledge  is  not  possible,  is  a 
rational  attitude  of  mind.  We  are  not  unreasonable 
beings  because  we  believe  some  things  which  cannot  be 
proved,  because  we  act  upon  convictions  when  exact 
demonstrations  are  out  of  the  question.  We  are  built 
for  action,  as  an  automobile  is  built  for  running;  it  is 
in  action  mainly  that  we  develop  our  powers,  and 
grow,  and  fill  a  place  of  usefulness  in  the  world;  and 
it  is  certain  that  the  greater  part  of  our  activity  in 
life,  which  naturally  looks  forward,  is  based  upon 
opinions,  convictions  and  judgments  which  are  not  sus- 
ceptible of  positive  proof.  The  whole  business  world 
subsists  in  confidence  between  man  and  man,  in  faith 
in  the  stabiKty  and  productiveness  of  Nature;  and 
governments  are  established,  laws  enacted,  treaties 
made,  and  even  wars  conducted  in  the  belief  that  cer- 
tain ends  are  attainable  and  justifiable,  and  that  cer- 
tain measures  will  prove  effective.  In  all  this  men  are 
neither  fools  nor  rascals  nor  bigots,  but  reasonable 
beings ;  for  well-grounded  faith  is  not  only  a  rational 
but  a  necessary  principle  in  the  management  of  the 
entire  domain  of  practical,  every-day  life. 

If,  then,  we  ask  what  faith  has  to  do  with  religion, 
the  answer  is  plain:  Faith  is  a  working  principle, 
which  has  reference  mainly  to  action,  and  which  is  as 


44.  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

valid  in  one  realm  as  in  another.  If  it  is  competent 
to  determine  an  attitude  or  a  course  of  conduct  in 
matters  of  learning  and  business  and  all  our  ordinary 
social  relationships,  it  is  not  to  be  ruled  out  of  court 
when  it  comes  to  testify  in  behalf  of  spiritual  interests. 
It  is  all  a  question  of  the  nature  of  the  evidence,  and 
of  sound  reasoning,  and  of  thorough  thinking  and  test- 
ing, and  of  intellectual  and  moral  integrity,  and  of 
candor  and  open-mindedness.  The  normal  action  of 
the  human  mind  simply  renders  it  inevitable  that  it 
should  trust  its  own  faculties,  and  trust  the  testimony 
of  other  minds,  and  trust  the  continuity  of  Nature's 
order;  and  whether  it  be  in  the  sphere  of  moral  and 
religious  concerns  or  in  that  of  material  or  so  called 
"practical"  affairs,  it  is  perfectly  reasonable  in  so 
doing.  This  faith  becomes  eJfFective  for  conduct,  taking 
the  place  of  knowledge  where  positive  knowledge  is 
not  possible,  and  so  fulfills  its  great  function.  In  the 
words  of  William  James,  "Faith  means  belief  in  some- 
thing concerning  which  doubt  is  still  theoretically 
possible;  and  as  the  test  of  belief  is  willingness  to 
act,  one  may  say  that  faith  is  the  readiness  to  act  in 
a  cause,  the  prosperous  issue  of  which  is  not  certified 
to  us  in  advance."  ^^ 

If  these  remarks  are  just,  they  fairly  dispose  of  the 
notion,  somewhat  prevalent  and  sometimes  cynically 
expressed,  that  religious  faith  consists  of  blind  belief, 
whereas  science  consists  of  absolute  knowledge.  Real  be- 
lief always  rests  upon  reasons  of  some  sort,  and  "blind 
belief"  is  no  belief  at  all,  but  mere  credulity.  The  so- 
called  "ages  of  faith"  were  largely  ages  of  credulity, 
superstition,  and  unquestioning  docility;  but  the  ages 
of  true  faith,  supported  by  learning  and  reason,  and 

1'  "Meaning  of  Truth,"  p.  256,  quoted  by  Prof.  R.  B.  Perry. 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH?     45 

guided  by  intelligent,  fearless  investigation,  are  only 
even  now  broadly  opening.  We  are  not  to  throw  the 
principle  of  faith  overboard,  but  to  understand  its 
proper  scope,  and  use  it  legitimately,  whether  in  reli- 
gious inquiry,  or  in  scientific  research,  or  in  practical 
conduct. 

We  are  now  prepared  to  appreciate  the  power  and 
helpfulness  of  real  faith.  It  sustains  men's  flagging 
spirits,  it  nerves  to  effort,  and  how  often  it  vindicates 
itself  as  a  dynamic  factor  in  human  enterprise!  The 
people  who  try  to  do  things  are  the  people  who  believe 
that  things  can  be  done.  Recall  Columbus  and  his  dis- 
covery of  America, — how  he  believed  the  earth  to  be 
round,  and  set  out  to  sail  around  it,  when  nearly  all 
Europe  thought  him  a  poor,  deluded  mortal:  his 
achievement  was  as  much  an  act  of  faith  as  any  in 
history.  Recall  Cyrus  W.  Field  and  his  success,  after 
repeated  failures  and  the  loss  of  large  wealth,  in  laying 
the  Atlantic  cable.  Think  of  Lieutenant  Peary  and 
his  final  triumph  in  reaching  the  North  Pole.  Think 
of  the  founders  of  our  Republic  and  of  their  belief  in 
the  principles  for  which  they  toiled  and  suffered. 
Think  of  Saint  Paul  and  how  his  whole  apostolic  career 
was  inspired  by  faith.  Think  of  our  modern  Christian 
missionaries,  from  Adoniram  Judson  to  the  hosts  that 
to-day  are  rearing  the  standard  of  the  Cross  in  a  thou- 
sand foreign  places.  Think  of  our  technical  engineers 
— civil,  mechanical,  mining,  sanitary — who  build  mar- 
velous bridges,  bore  tunnels  through  mountains  and 
under  rivers,  dig  canals  like  Suez  and  Panama,  swing 
railroads  over  chasms  or  around  dizzy  heights,  con- 
struct enormous  reservoirs  and  redeem  arid  wastes, 
conquer  plague  and  disease  by  cleansing  the  earth,  and 


46  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

so  help  to  make  this  old  world  into  a  new  paradise. 
All  these  and  myriads  of  others  have  been  people  of 
action  because  they  have  been  people  of  both  knowl- 
edge and  faith;  they  have  based  their  faith  upon  their 
knowledge,  and  have  thus  believed  that  things  could 
be  done,  and  therefore  have  attempted  and  achieved. 
Always  it  has  been  action,  action,  action  which  knowl- 
edge and  faith  have  served ;  and  both  knowledge  and 
faith  have  found  their  sufficient  recompense  in  endeavor 
and  accomplishment.  Intelligent  faith  inspires  to 
effort,  while  doubt  freezes  the  soul  and  paralyzes  the 
arm.     Men  who  do  not  believe  do  not  achieve. 

But  it  must  be  said  that  religious  faith  has  a  quality 
peculiarly  its  own  and  yields  a  blessing  peculiarly  rich. 
This  is  because  religion  is  so  largely  an  affair  of  the 
inner  life.  Its  springs  are  within,  even  though  its 
activities  be  outward.  It  consists  primarily  and  mainly 
in  an  attitude  of  the  soul,— in  ideas,  thoughts,  desires, 
convictions,  aspirations,  hopes,  purposes  and  endeavors 
that  are  considered  profoundly  vital  and  sacred.  Thus 
it  subsists  among  interests  which  are  less  tangible, 
perhaps,  than  those  of  science  and  business  and  engi- 
neering; at  any  rate  they  cannot  be  weighed  and 
measured  and  appraised  by  the  same  standards ;  but 
they  are  not,  therefore,  any  the  less  real  or  important 
— they  are  simply  different.  Being  essentially  spirit- 
ual, religion  has  regard  mainly  to  spiritual  influences ; 
it  listens  for  the  inner  voice,  it  heeds  the  inner  man- 
date, it  seeks  ever  the  inner  satisfactions — "the  peace 
of  God  which  passeth  all  understanding."  Its  life  is 
a  holy  life,  whose  experiences  are  not  always  reducible 
to  rule  and  regulation  and  explanation;  and  it  has  in- 
sights, intimations,  promptings,  restraints,  joys,  sor- 
rows, guidances  which  come  we  know  not  how, — which 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH?     47 

come,  we  may  believe,  because  the  finite  spirit,  man, 
sustains  living  relations  to  the  Infinite  Spirit,  God. 
"There  is  a  spirit  in  man,  and  the  inspiration  of  the 
Almighty  giveth  him  understanding,"  said  young 
Elihu  in  his  answer  to  the  three  friends  of  Job.  This 
"inspiration"  is  often  the  secret  and  chief  source  of 
the  real  faith  that  lives,  quietly  but  potently,  within  a 
man's  soul  and  shapes  his  outward  conduct.  Probably 
of  no  other  kind  of  faith  than  religious  faith  can  this 
be  said.  It  is  peculiarly  inward  and  vital  and  sacred 
because  such  is  the  very  nature  of  spiritual  religion; 
and  therefore  it  has  ranges  of  apprehension  which  the 
intellectual  processes  of  reasoning  may  not,  alone,  com- 
pletely gauge.  Saint  Paul  uttered  a  profound  truth 
when  he  said,  "The  physical  man  receiveth  not  the 
things  of  the  spirit  of  God ;  for  they  are  foolishness 
unto  him:  neither  can  he  know  them;  for  they  are 
spiritually  discerned."  As  one  who  has  not  an  ear 
for  music  may  not  know  the  delights  of  music,  or  as 
one  who  has  no  eye  for  beauty  may  not  have  the  judg- 
ment and  the  joy  of  the  artist;  so  one  who  has  not 
an  awakened  or  a  cultivated  spiritual  sense  may  not 
know  the  meaning  of  the  inner  light,  the  inner  voice, 
the  inner  peace, — "the  peace  of  God  which  passeth 
all  understanding." 

But  a  man  who  has  attained  to  some  measure  of 
such  spiritual  discernment  derives  a  great  blessing  from 
his  religious  faith.  He  is  "sustained  and  soothed  by 
an  unfaltering  trust"  when  there  is  no  other  power 
to  give  him  courage  to  try  to  go  on,  or  to  bear  up, 
or  to  accept  what  the  day  brings.  He  is  prompted, 
restrained  and  led  by  his  inner  faith-sense  when  there 
is  no  other  guidance  for  him.  The  writer  of  the  Epistle 
to  the  Hebrews  says:     "By  faith  Abraham,  when  he 


48  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

was  called  to  go  out  into  a  place  which  he  should  after 
receive  for  an  inheritance,  obeyed;  and  he  went  out, 
not  knowing  whither  he  went."  ^^  How  often  do  men 
go  and  come,  hither  and  thither,  on  this  enterprise  or 
that,  without  being  able  to  tell  precisely  why  except 
that  they  have  a  secret,  inner,  indefinable  belief  that 
they  ought,  or  ought  not,  to  do  so  and  so !  It  is  the 
faith-sense  which  belongs  to  the  spiritually-sensitized 
soul;  and  it  is  sometimes  the  most  unerring  guidance 
which  a  mortal  man  can  have  through  the  mazes  of 
life's  bewildering  situations.  And  there  is  inspiration 
in  genuine  faith,  the  inspiration  of  spiritual  life  and 
power,  which  heals  the  infirmities  of  the  soul  and,  as 
we  are  learning  anew  in  these  days,  may  go  far  toward 
the  healing  of  the  body.  For  life  is  always  the  great 
builder,  and  real  faith  is  a  form  or  attitude  of  life, 
even  the  highest  life  that  we  know;  and  who  can  limit 
the  extent  to  which  its  influence  may  filter  down  into 
the  lower  life.'^  Then  what  courage  is  imparted  to  the 
minds  and  hearts  of  ordinary  people  when,  in  times  of 
trial  or  danger,  a  strong  man  stands  up  amongst  them 
and  speaks  words  of  confidence  and  wisdom !  Was  it 
not  James  A.  Garfield,  who,  on  the  evening  following 
the  assassination  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  addressed  from 
a  balcony  in  New  York  City  an  excited  multitude  in 
the  street,  and  began  by  saying:  "Fellow-citizens,  God 
reigns,  and  the  Government  at  Washington  still  lives" ; 
when  instantly  a  tide  of  comfort  and  hope  and  calm- 
ness poured  itself  into  the  souls  of  those  sorrowing, 
anxious  men  and  women.'*  What  is  the  orator  without 
faith,  whether  he  be  statesman  or  preacher .?  What, 
indeed,  is  the  essence  of  statesmanship  or  true  preach- 
ing but  the  establishment  of  a  sound  and  righteous 
i»Heb.  xi.8. 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH?     49 

faith  among  the  people,  individually  and  corporately, 
which  shall  make  them  stand  and  labor  for  everything 
good  and  pure  and  just?"  "Thy  faith  shall  make  thee 
whole," — a  faith  that  is  vital,  enlightened,  profound, 
sincere  and  sacred  shall  cure  our  personal  and  social 
ills  as  nothing  else  can  ever  do.  Faith  that  better 
things  are  possible,  faith  that  wise  and  honest  human 
effort  is  worth  while,  faith  that  the  laws  of  the  universe 
are  benevolent  and  will  hold  together, — this  at  least 
is  the  downright  and  dominant  conviction  that  lives 
somehow  in  the  heart  of  every  man  who  is  trying  to 
do  something  to  help  himself  and  his  fellow-men.  With- 
out such  a  faith  he  is  powerless  and  of  course  useless. 
Now  how  may  so  noble  a  faith  be  acquired?  Well, 
first  of  all,  by  duly  realizing  that  it  is  an  acquisition, 
an  attainment,  an  achievement.  It  is  not  something 
that  can  be  given,  but  rather  something  to  be  won. 
Lowell  said: 

"Freedom  and  truth  and  all  that  these  contain 
Drop  not  like  ripened  fruit  about  our  feet: 
We  climb   to   them  through  years  of  sweat   and  pain." 

So  do  we  climb  to  any  great,  vital,  worthy  faith. 
We  come  to  it  through  experience.  It  grows  out  of 
the  life;  so  that  the  kind  of  faith  we  shall  have  will 
depend  on  the  kind  of  life  we  live.  In  other  words,  a 
noble,  spiritual  faith  is  not  so  much  the  beginning  of 
a  good  life  as  it  is  the  product  thereof.  What,  then, 
must  be  the  leading  marks  of  such  a  life  in  order  that 
it  may  yield  such  a  faith? 

1.  There  must  be  thoughtfulness,  open-mindedness, 
intellectual  hospitality,  growth  in  knowledge,  under- 
standing and  wisdom.  While  intelligence  is  not  the 
whole  of  life,  and  its  limitations  must  be  duly  appre- 
ciated, yet  it  is  always  one  of  the  principal  means  of 


60  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

the  soul's  progressive  development.  All  our  powers 
of  perception,  reason  and  judgment,  with  all  the  sound 
learning  they  can  win,  must  underlie  a  faith  that  shall 
be  ample,  lofty,  and  adequate  to  the  needs  of  the 
ever-expanding  life  of  the  human  spirit. 

2.  There  must  be  sincerity,  honesty,  conscientious- 
ness, uprightness,  moral  integrity,  purity,  virtue, — 
in  one  word,  that  great  quality  which  the  Bible  calls 
righteousness.  He  who  flouts  the  moral  law  in  his 
conduct  will  soon  flout  it  in  his  thought.  No  man  can 
live  a  corrupt  life  and  long  retain  a  growing  faith  in 
goodness.  He  must  himself  strive  to  be  just  and  true 
who  would  build  up  through  the  years  a  sublime  faith 
in  the  Everlasting  Righteousness. 

3.  There  must  be  benevolence,  good  will,  loving-kind- 
ness, mercy,  compassion,  sympathy.  For  it  is  in  the 
soil  which  these  qualities  continually  fertilize  that  the 
roots  of  a  generous  faith  are  best  nourished.  The 
opposite  qualities  will  starve  and  ultimately  kill  all 
high,  ardent,  magnanimous  confidence  in  either  human 
or  divine  things.  Live  unselfishly  and  helpfully  among 
your  fellow  men,  and  you  can  scarcely  fail  to  believe 
somehow  in  the  Eternal  Goodness. 

4.  No  less  must  there  be  the  spirit  of  reverence, 
the  spirit  of  holiness,  a  region  of  inner  calm  and  deep 
piety  which  is  the  very  sanctuary  of  the  soul.  Here 
must  be  generated  the  most  vital  forces  that  make  for 
a  spiritual  faith.  Only  when  a  man  somehow  finds  God 
within  shall  he  be  likely  to  discover  traces  of  Him  with- 
out. It  is  by  seeking  Him  within,  by  retiring  to  that 
purely  private  communion  with  the  Infinite  Spirit 
which  it  is  the  priceless  privilege  of  the  finite  spirit  to 
hold,  that  the  most  profound  and  certain  assurance 
is  experienced  which  enables  a  man,  not  only  to  believe. 


WHAT  IS  THE  VALIDITY  OF  FAITH?     51 

but  to  know  that  the  Divine  Presence  is  the  Supreme 
Reality  of  life. 

5.  Finally,  there  must  be  a  resolute  attitude,  the 
resolute  will,  if  faith  is  to  be  vigorous.  Constituted 
as  we  are,  situated  as  we  are,  in  such  a  world  as  this, 
among  our  kind,  we  are  called,  not  only  to  a  contem- 
plative life  and  a  speculative  life,  but  even  more  to 
an  active  life, — a  life  of  active  goodness,  of  service, 
of  helpful  and  creative  activity.  "My  Father  worketh 
hitherto,  and  I  work,"  said  Jesus.  It  is  every  man's 
great  prerogative  to  do  likewise,  to  be  a  co-laborer 
together  with  God;  and  only  when  he  sets  his  will 
resolutely  to  this  purpose,  consecrating  all  his  powers 
to  usefulness,  resolved  to  toil  on  and  in  his  toil  rejoice, 
even  when  the  day  grows  dark  and  terror  overspreads 
the  land  and  sadness  fills  the  heart  with  tears, — only 
so  can  one  build  up  within  himself,  year  by  year,  an 
invincible  faith,  that  shall  hold  him  steadfast  through 
all  storms,  and  make  him  a  tower  of  strength  for  the 
shelter  of  other  troubled  souls. 

"O  living  will  that  shalt  endure 

When  all  that  seems  shall  suifer  shock, 
Rise  in  the  spiritual  rock, 
Flow  thro'  our  deeds  and  make  them  pure, 

That  we  may  lift  from  out  of  dust 

A  voice  as  unto  him  that  hears, 

A  cry  above  the  conquer'd  years. 
To  one  that  with  us  works,  and  trust. 

With  faith  that  comes  of  self-control. 
The  truths  that  never  can  be  proved 
Until  we  close  with  all  we  loved, 

And  all  we  flow  from,  soul  in  soul."" 

"  Tennyson,  In  Memoriam,  CXXX. 


Ill 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD! 


HAVING  seen  what  is  the  intrinsic  nature  of 
religion  and  what  is  the  true  validity  of  faith, 
we  are  ready  to  ask  what  we  can  know  of  God. 
It  is  the  central  and  supreme  question  in  our  study. 
Of  course  the  subject  is  so  vast  and  so  enshrouded  in 
mystery  that  we  inevitably  experience  the  greatest  diffi- 
culty in  bringing  it  within  the  range  of  our  compre- 
hension. Yet  it  is  best  to  treat  it  in  as  clear  and  simple 
a  way  as  possible,  avoiding  all  unnecessary  technicality 
of  thought  and  language.  If  God  is  a  Reality  and  not 
merely  a  Name,  and  if  all  men  are  somehow  related  to 
Him  and  need  to  know  about  Him,  there  ought  to  be 
some  means  of  apprehending  Him,  or  of  ascertaining  a 
large  and  vital  measure  of  truth  concerning  Him, 
which  an  open-minded  and  sincere  soul  can  understand 
withou-t  profound  learning. 

At  the  very  outset  our  problem  presents  three  as- 
pects, which  may  be  indicated  by  three  subordinate 
questions :  What  does  the  idea  of  God  signify  ?  what 
kind  of  knowledge  is  meant  when  we  speak  of  knowing 
Him.''  and  how,  by  what  method,  by  virtue  of  what 
faculty  or  attainment  or  experience,  are  we  enabled 
to  gain  such  knowledge  .^^  If  we  can  find  valid  answers 
to  these  questions,  we  shall  at  least  open  up  a  wide 
field  of  inquiry  and  shall  discover  how  exceedingly  im- 
portant are  the  issues  which  it  contains. 

I.  For  ourselves  the  idea  of  God  lies  at  the  very  cen- 

52 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?  53 

ter  of  religion;  indeed,  educated  as  we  Occidentals  of 
the  present  age  have  been,  it  is  difficult  for  us  to  think 
of  religion  without  reference  to  a  belief  in  a  deity  or  in 
deities — although,  as  has  been  previously  pointed  out. 
Doctor  Brinton  reminds  us  that  Buddhism  inculcates 
no  such  belief.  We,  however,  habitually  assume  the 
existence  of  a  Supreme  Being,  whom  we  call  by  a 
variety  of  names,  derived  mostly  from  the  Hebrew  and 
Christian  Scriptures.  Whether  any  two  of  us  have 
exactly  the  same  idea  when  we  speak  of  this  Being,  it 
may  be  hard  to  tell,  because  ideas  are  seldom,  if  ever, 
expressed  with  absolute  precision  and  completeness ;  so 
that  we  can  only  judge  one  another  with  approximate 
correctness  at  best.  But  so  far  as  a  general  statement 
may  go  in  representing  the  common  conception  of 
thoughtful  people,  it  may  be  fairly  said  that  our  re- 
ligious faith  postulates  a  Supreme  Spiritual  Per- 
sonality as  the  Ultimate  Source  of  all  phenomena, 
whose  power,  wisdom,  goodness  and  love  fill  the  uni- 
verse, who  creates,  sustains,  animates  and  rules  all 
worlds,  who  is  the  Author  of  our  being  and  "the  Father 
of  the  spirits  of  all  flesh,"  whose  providence  is  in  all 
human  history  because  He  is  the  Moral  Governor  of 
mankind,  and  whose  purposes  concerning  the  children 
of  men  have  been  specially  revealed  to  them  in  different 
ways,  but  preeminently  in  the  life  and  teaching  of 
Jesus  Christ.  To  be  sure,  some  of  these  notions  would 
not  be  accepted  by  everybody;  the  last  one,  for  in- 
stance, a  devout  Jew  would  be  obliged  to  reject:  and 
doubtless  there  are  many,  educated  in  modern  science 
and  philosophy,  who  would  admit  that  they  recognize 
an  Inscrutable  Power  that  they  sincerely  reverence, 
but  that  they  are  unable  to  call  personal  in  any  such 
anthropomorphic    fashion    as    our    language    implies. 


54  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

But  these  are  qualifications  which  do  not  greatly  aflfect 
the  essential  truth,  and  the  statement  as  a  whole  may 
be  allowed  to  stand  as  a  rough  but  tolerably  accurate 
expression  of  the  prevalent  idea  of  God  forming  the 
background  of  religious  thinking  among  intelligent 
people  to-day. 

No  need  to  trace  here  the  historical  development  of 
the  rich  content  of  this  great,  complex  conception, 
though  that  were  a  highly  profitable  task;  suffice  it  to 
say  that  such  development  would  be  found  to  run  from 
animism  to  polytheism,  from  polytheism  to  monothe- 
ism, from  monotheism  to  Christian  paternalism,  and 
from  Christian  paternalism  to  those  scientific  and  philo- 
sophical constructions  which,  in  our  own  time,  are 
denoted  by  the  terms  Realism,  Idealism,  Absolutism, 
etc.  The  fact  is  that  man's  idea  of  God  has  changed 
and  grown  with  his  long,  slow,  painful  progress  in 
other  respects ;  many  and  diverse  influences  have  modi- 
fied it;  and  now  new  and  powerful  influences  are  tend- 
ing to  modify  it  still  further.  Nevertheless  it  has  per- 
sisted, in  one  form  or  another,  through  all  the  muta- 
tions and  expansions  of  the  past,  increasing  rather 
than  diminishing  in  its  significance ;  and  this  striking 
fact  aff^ords  a  fair  warrant  for  expecting  that  it  will 
continue  to  hold  its  place  somehow  in  the  enlarging 
thought  of  the  world,  and  will  still  control 

"With  growing  sway  the  growing  life  of  man." 

What  diff*erence  does  it  make  whether  this  idea  be 
retained?  The  world  will  continue,  life  will  go  on, 
the  generations  will  pass,  each  individual  will  play  his 
httle  part  in  the  drama  of  existence  and  quickly  dis- 
appear; yea,  measured  on  the  scale  which  astronomers 
employ  to  gauge  magnitudes  and  durations,  our  earth 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?  55 

itself  will  soon  enough  share  the  fate  of  other  planets 
that  have  frozen  up  or  have  coalesced  to  make  some 
new  flaming  star:  what  boots  it  whether  we  think  that 
a  Supreme  Wisdom  sits  upon  the  throne  of  the  uni- 
verse, whether  we  are  sure  that  an  Eternal  Love  lives 
in  its  heart? 

Well,  there  are  times  when  it  does  not  seem  to  mat- 
ter much,  one  way  or  the  other:  we  are  busy  with  the 
affairs  of  life,  we  are  full  of  energy  and  ambition, 
happiness  is  our  daily  portion,  and  every  prospect  is 
bright;  or  perhaps  we  are  living  all  unworthily,  being 
steeped  in  sensuality,  refined  or  coarse,  stupefied  by 
sin,  calloused  by  selfishness,  full  of  wrath  and  doubting : 
in  either  case,  very  likely,  we  do  not  care  a  fig  for 
the  thought  of  God,  even  as  we  do  not  imagine  that 
He — if  He  be  at  all — can  care  a  fig  for  us.  But  by 
and  by  a  change  comes,  some  shock  of  doom  occurs — 
the  loss  of  health  or  wealth,  the  sorrow  of  a  great 
bereavement,  the  ruin  of  our  personal  fortunes  and 
hopes  by  such  a  calamity  as  an  earthquake  or  a  war, 
desolating  a  land  or  consuming  nations — and  lo!  we 
are  suddenly  brought  face  to  face  with  the  tremendous 
fact  that  this  world  is  full  of  tragedy.  Then  we  begin 
to  think  more  deeply,  and  to  wonder  what  it  all  means, 
and  to  ask  whether  there  is  anything  to  come  when 
the  tragedy  ends.  We  search  our  own  hearts,  we 
listen  to  our  fellow  men,  we  read  books,  we  study  sci- 
ence and  philosophy,  we  peer  into  the  vast,  deep 
mystery  of  the  surrounding  universe  for  an  answer  to 
our  anxious  questioning.  Is  the  Infinite  Power  that 
we  behold  everywhere,  controlling  all  worlds,  and  here 
on  earth  making  or  breaking  our  human  lives, — is  this 
Power  personal  and  paternal,  or  merely  an  all-pervad- 
ing Energy  without  benevolence  or  purpose  or  intelli- 


56  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

gence?  It  is  not  merely  a  speculative  problem;  it 
involves  our  own  destiny  and  the  destiny  of  those  who 
were  dearer  to  us  than  life  itself,  but  who  have  passed 
beyond  our  sight ;  nay,  the  hope  of  civilization,  the 
hope  for  the  progress  of  mankind  here  upon  the  earth, 
is  bound  up  in  the  final  analysis  with  the  character  of 
the  Ultimate  Reality,  however  named,  that  abides  for- 
ever at  the  center  of  things.  With  the  soul  full  of 
grief  and  pain,  with  tens  of  thousands  of  human  beings 
perishing  "in  a  moment,  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye," 
as  in  the  Italian  earthquake  only  recently,  with  Euro- 
pean society  shaken  to  its  foundations  by  the  most 
terrific  struggle  of  all  history,  and  with  this  planet 
and  every  form  of  life  upon  it  doomed  to  eventual 
extinction,  what  ground  have  we  for  supposing  that 
our  existence  has  any  high  and  permanent  worth,  save 
as  it  is  embraced  somehow  in  the  sweep  and  care  of 
that  Almighty  Providence  whose  dominion  is  from  ever- 
lasting to  everlasting?     It  is  hard  to  see. 

Such  is  a  hint,  albeit  only  a  hint,  of  what  the  idea 
of  God  signifies,  and  of  the  difference  it  makes  whether 
we  hold  it  or  not. 

II.  Now  what  kind  of  knowledge  is  meant  when  we 
speak  of  knowing  God.^ 

We  have  seen  that  the  word  knowledge  is  a  some- 
what elastic  term.  In  its  more  restricted  sense  it 
denotes  those  things  of  which  we  are  clearly  conscious, 
contained  within  the  mind  itself, — such  as  ideas, 
thoughts,  feelings,  convictions ;  such  as  mental,  moral, 
spiritual  states,  various  and  ever-changing;  such  as 
memories,  aspirations,  hopes,  fears,  etc. ;  or  those 
things  which  are  objective,  but  of  which  we  are  indis- 
putably aware  through  sense  perception, — as  when  we 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?  57 

say  that  we  know  that  the  sun  is  shining,  that  the 
grass  is  green,  that  iron  is  hard  and  heavy,  that  some 
sounds  are  musical  while  others  are  harsh  noises,  that 
a  rose  is  fragrant,  that  sugar  is  sweet,  etc. ;  or  those 
things  which  arc  demonstrable  by  processes  of  reason- 
ing which  we  cannot  gainsay,  like  the  propositions  of 
mathematics  and  the  inferences  which  we  are  compelled 
to  draw  from  axiomatic  truths.  In  its  broader  sense 
it  denotes  a  vast  body  of  information  which  comes  to 
most  of  us  "second  hand,"  upon  the  authoi'ity  of 
scholars  or  experts,  the  testimony  of  observers  and 
writers,  the  common  understanding  of  educated  people ; 
information,  much  of  it,  which  has  been  slowly  built  up 
during  ages  of  study,  like  nearly  all  our  sciences ;  or 
information  that  is  widely  diffused  by  the  press,  by 
libraries,  schools  and  learned  societies;  indeed,  the 
whole  great  mass  of  what  we  call  general  intelligence 
or  knowledge  or  learning,  consisting  of  information 
which  rests  back  somewhere  upon  some  one's  "say  so," 
usually  with  adequate  reason,  but  not  invariably. 

Into  which  of  these  two  classes  does  our  possible 
knowledge  of  God  fall.? 

There  are  those  who  affirm  that  it  falls  distinctly 
within  the  field  of  consciousness.  They  speak  as  if 
they  thought  that  we  can  be  as  conscious  of  God  as 
we  are  of  ourselves,  or  as  we  are  of  our  passing  moods 
and  our  permanent  convictions.  But  if  this  were  so, 
it  would  seem  as  though  all  men  would  be  agreed  about 
it ;  whereas  a  few  positively  deny  the  existence  of  God, 
many  more  consider  that  it  is  impossible  to  know 
whether  He  exists  or  not,  and  a  multitude  of  others, 
while  earnestly  believing  in  Him,  doubt  whether  it  is 
strictly  proper  to  say  that  we  are  actually  conscious 
of  Him.     At  the  same  time  it  must  be  remarked  that 


58  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

the  word  consciousness  has  come  lately  to  have  a  larger 
signification  than  formerly.  The  physiological  psy- 
chologists are  showing  us  that  each  man's  conscious- 
ness embraces,  not  only  a  central  area  of  great 
vividness  of  perception  and  realization,  but  a  surround- 
ing or  an  underlying  area  of  diminishing  vividness, 
shading  off  into  dimness  and  darkness ;  and  that  from 
this  shadowy  region — called  the  unconscious,  or  the 
subconscious,  or  the  subliminal — there  come  ideas,  ap- 
prehensions, insights,  suggestions,  promptings,  inspira- 
tions which,  in  moments  of  intense  experience,  flame  up 
into  the  central  area  of  vivid  understanding,  like 
flashes  of  light;  or,  without  thus  manifesting  them- 
selves, they  may  remain  hidden  in  that  deep  reservoir, 
and  yet  may  be  potent  to  shape  our  beliefs,  judgments 
and  actions. ^^  If  these  things  are  so,  it  may  very 
well  be  that  our  apprehension  of  God  is  usually  of  this 
vague,  feeble  or  submerged  character,  but  that  in  mo- 
ments of  illumination  and  exaltation,  and  in  rare  souls 
perhaps  continuously,  it  flames  up  as  a  blessed  cer- 
tainty and  a  living  reality  in  the  vivid  center  of 
conscious  experience.  Thus  we  can  understand  how  a 
spiritually  awakened  man — one,  for  instance,  who  has 
felt  very  deeply  the  influence  of  Jesus  Christ  and  has 
responded  to  it — may  have  a  religious  consciousness 
which  makes  him  as  surely  aware  of  the  presence  and 

^"  "Our  studies  up  to  this  point  have  led  us  to  the  general  con- 
clusion that  a  large  measure  of  the  experiences  of  life  are  con- 
served or  deposited  in  what  may  be  called  a  storehouse  of  neuro- 
pathic dispositions  or  residua.  This  storehouse  is  the  unconscious. 
From  this  storehouse  our  conscious  processes  draw  for  the  ma- 
terial of  thought.  Further,  a  large  amount  and  variety  of  evi- 
dence .  .  .  has  shown  that  conserved  experiences  may  function 
without  arising  into  consciousness,  i.e.,  as  a  subconscious  process." 
— "The  Unconscious,"  p.  229,  by  Morton  Prince,  M.D.,  LL.D.,  the 
Macmillan  Co.,  1914. 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?  69 

power  of  God  in  his  life  as  he  is  that  he  loves  his 
fcllowmen;  while  one  who  has  never  had  any  such 
quickening  of  the  soul,  who  has  never  been  in  any  sense 
"born  from  above,"  may  have  no  touch  of  a  similar 
awareness — and  will  be  likely  to  have  none  until  some- 
thing arouses  him,  when  he  will  exclaim  as  Jacob  did 
when  he  awaked  out  of  sleep,  "Surely  the  Lord  is  in 
this  place,  and  I  knew  it  not."  ^^ 

But  since  it  is  plain  that  not  all  men  are  indubitably 
conscious  of  God,  but  that  even  the  best  of  witnesses, 
while  sure  that  He  is,  cannot  tell  exactly  what  He  is, 
and  that  they  and  we  and  all  are  forever  seeking  Him, 
if  haply  we  may  feel  after  Him  and  find  Him,  it  ap- 
pears best  to  say  that  our  possible  knowledge  of  God 
partakes  rather  of  the  character  of  belief  than  of 
actual  consciousness  or  of  positive  demonstration.  In 
other  words,  it  is  a  composite  conviction,  to  which  many 
factors  contribute,  and  possesses  so  high  a  degree  of 
probability  as  to  amount  to  practical  certainty  while 
falling  short  of  absolute  certainty.  Accordingly  we 
are  thrown  back  upon  the  position  taken  in  the  pre- 
ceding chapter.  We  there  saw  that  only  a  small  part 
of  what  we  call  knowledge  consists  of  things  which 
can  be  precisely  and  conclusively  proved,  while  the 
greater  part  consists  of  things  which  we  believe  upon 
evidence  sufficient  in  amount  and  quality  to  produce 
conviction  in  minds  competent  to  appreciate  it.  Upon 
such  conviction  we  act  in  all  the  practical  relationships 
of  life,  and  are  reasonable  beings  in  so  doing.  We 
are  to  think,  learn,  reason,  test,  prove,  as  far  as  possi- 
ble, in  all  our  study  on  any  and  every  subject;  but 
then  we  are  compelled  to  admit  that  we  can  know  only 
a   very   little   at   best,   and   are   obliged   to   beUeve   a 

"^  Gen.  xxviii:16. 


60  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

thousand  things  which  we  cannot  demonstrate,  and  to 
await  many  other  things  which  we  are  not  yet  prepared 
either  to  believe  or  to  deny.  So  we  are  forced  to  "walk 
by  faith,  not  by  sight,"  if  we  walk  at  all, — ^just  as  we 
travel  along  a  country  road  at  night,  seeing  a  little 
way  ahead,  and  that  little  sufficing.  Because  we  can- 
not see  the  end  of  the  journey  from  the  beginning, 
shall  we  refuse  to  travel  altogether? 

This  position  is  thoroughly  tenable.  A  man  may 
properly  say,  *'I  believe  in  the  existence  of  God,  and 
am  prepared  to  give  my  reasons  for  so  doing,"  when 
he  could  not  truthfully  say,  "I  know  that  God  exists, 
and  I  can  prove  it,  and  indeed  I  am  conscious  of  it." 
One  may  be  conscious  of  the  thought  of  God,  and  the 
idea  may  be  very  distinct  in  his  mind;  he  may  be  con- 
scious of  deep  reverence  and  earnest  aspiration  with 
reference  to  what  he  feels  to  be  the  Divine  Presence; 
and  he  may  be  conscious  of  a  firm  conviction  that  there 
is  an  infinite  "Power  not  ourselves  that  makes  for 
righteousness,"  that  he  conceives  as  the  Soul  of  the 
universe  and  gladly  calls  the  Father  in  heaven.  But 
all  this  is  purely  subjective;  and  the  question  is,  How, 
speaking  strictly,  can  one  claim  to  be  conscious  of 
the  objective  reality,?  To  be  sure  it  may  be  answered 
that,  under  our  modern  conception  of  the  Divine 
immanence,  God  is  not  only  an  objective  reality,  but 
also  a  living,  indwelling  Spirit,  manifesting  Himself  in 
a  subjective  experience;  and  that  therefore  we  may 
rightly  say  that  we  are  conscious  of  Him,  even  as  we 
are  conscious  that  we  live  in  Humanity  and  that  Hu- 
manity lives  in  us.  But  this  is  an  extension  of  the 
older  meaning  of  the  word  consciousness  which  seems 
somewhat  unwarrantable — although  it  would  be  sanc- 
tioned readily  enough  by  Bergson  and  others  who  speak 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?  61 

freely  of  consciousness  in  animals  and  even  in  plants. ^^ 
Former  usage  limited  the  term  to  the  representation 
of  those  activities  and  states  of  mind  which  constituted 
clear,  positive  intelligence,  of  which  one  could  be  en- 
tirely certain:  when  one  was  said  to  be  conscious  of 
anything  one  was  perfectly  sure  of  it ;  there  was  no 
doubt,  no  misgiving,  no  uncertainty.  In  such  strict 
sense  can  it  be  said  that  any  man  is  as  conscious  of 
God  as  he  is  of  his  own  mental  processes  ?  Perhaps ! 
but  the  instances  are  unquestionably  rare ;  and  these 
rare  instances,  together  with  those  less  vivid  or  even 
unconscious  experiences,  just  alluded  to,  which  are 
nowadays  covered  by  the  word  consciousness,  afford 
rather  one  of  the  arguments  for  believing  in  the  exist- 
ence of  God  than  an  absolute  proof  of  such  existence. 
In  the  language  of  President  J.  G.  Schurman,  "I  ap- 
prehend no  little  harm  has  been  done  by  attempting 
to  make  our  belief  in  God  more  certain  than  it  actually 
is.  We  have  such  a  belief,  and  I  hold  it  is  legitimate ; 
but  it  does  not  belong  to  that  kind  of  absolutely  cer- 
tain knowledge  we  are  able  to  have  of  objects  so  simple 
and  abstract  as  the  space  and  numbers  of  mathe- 
matics." ^^  Again  he  says,  "I  am  unable  to  assign  to 
our  belief  in  God  a  higher  certainty  than  that  possessed 
by  the  working  hypotheses  of  science."  ^^ 

Such,  then,  is  the  fundamental  quality  of  our  knowl- 
edge of  God;  it  bears  essentially  the  character  of  be- 
lief; it  is  a  great,  composite  conviction,  produced  by 
many  factors,  and  possesses  (for  most  people  at  any 
rate)  so  high  a  degree  of  probability  as  to  amount  to 
practical  certainty  while  falling  short  of  absolute 
certainty. 

^^  See  Bergson,  "Creative  Evolution,"  pp.  130,  135-6,  143. 

^"Belief  in  God,"  p.  40. 

="  Ibid.,  p.  43. 


6a  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

III.  Now  how  may  this  "knowledge"  be  gained,  how 
may  this  great  conviction  be  established?  By  virtue 
of  what  faculty  or  attainment  or  experience  in  our- 
selves can  we  apprehend  God  or  ascertain  important 
truth  concerning  Him? 

Well,  the  first  thing  to  be  said  is  that  any  knowledge 
of  God  which  we  can  acquire,  any  conviction  regarding 
Him  which  we  can  establish,  must  be,  at  best,  extremely 
meager.  We  may  apprehend  Him,  but  we  cannot  com- 
prehend Him, — we  finite  beings  cannot  put  the  reach 
of  our  thought  around  the  Infinite  Being;  if  we  could 
do  so.  He  would  soon  cease  to  be  of  interest  to  the  ever- 
expanding  soul  of  man,  and  would  become  as  the  myth- 
ical deities  of  antiquity. 

The  next  thing  to  be  said  is  that  the  various  names 
which  we  apply  to  God,  whether  they  be  Pagan  or 
Hebrew  or  Christian,  whether  they  smack  of  religion 
or  science  or  philosophy,  are  only  so  many  signs  by 
which  we,  like  little  children,  seek  to  designate  a  Reality 
that  we  instinctively  recognize  as  transcendent.  We 
may  call  him  "Jehovah,  Jove  or  Lord,"  the  Eternal, 
the  Almighty  or  the  Living  God, — we  may  characterize 
Him  as  the  Heavenly  Father,  the  Supreme  Ruler,  the 
"Power  not  ourselves  that  makes  for  righteousness," 
the  Universal  Energy,  the  Absolute,  or  the  Great 
Spirit :  but  all  these  and  all  kindred  terms  and  descrip- 
tions are  only  suggestive  symbols,  partial  and  in- 
adequate, to  represent  our  confessedly  limited  concep- 
tions of  the  Illimitable  and  the  Inscrutable  Being. 
"The  Holy  One  that  inhabiteth  eternity,"  however  con- 
cealed or  revealed,  must  be  so  much  higher  and  greater 
than  we  can  imagine  that  any  name  which  we  may  em- 
ploy to  denote  Him  should  be  spoken  with  some  degree 
of  reverent  reserve. 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?  63 

In  the  next  place  it  is  obvious  that,  if  God  is  and 
if  He  corresponds  at  all  to  what  we  mean  by  these 
high  appellatives,  He  must  be  apprehended  in  different 
ways  by  different  minds.  Even  of  the  material  uni- 
verse the  same  thing  is  true:  one  person  apprehends 
mainly  its  law  and  order,  another  its  beauty,  another 
its  terror,  and  still  another  its  benevolence.  How  much 
more  must  such  be  the  case  with  the  Infinite  Spirit 
that  is  the  Soul  of  the  universe!  One  person  may  see 
or  feel  chiefly  His  power  and  glory,  another  His  jus- 
tice and  severity,  another  His  goodness  and  love,  and 
still  another  His  forgiving  and  redeeming  grace.  All 
religious  literature,  preeminently  the  Bible,  is  full  of 
this  great  variety  of  human  thinking  about  the  Divine 
Nature.  He  is  ever  alluded  to  as  "manifesting"  Him- 
self now  in  one  way,  now  in  another  way,  and  as  having 
"spoken"  to  mankind  "by  divers  portions  and  in  divers 
manners"  ^^ ;  but  this  is  only  another  form  of  expres- 
sion to  indicate  the  truth  that  the  children  of  men, 
with  their  various  moods  and  experiences  in  a  changing 
world,  see  God  through  broken  lights  and  shadows, 
"through  a  glass,  darkly,"  and  not  "face  to  face,"  and 
find  Him  according  to  their  insight  and  understanding. 
"With  the  merciful  thou  wilt  shew  thyself  merciful, 
with  the  upright  man  thou  wilt  shew  thyself  upright. 
With  the  pure  thou  wilt  shew  thyself  pure;  and  with 
the  froward  thou  wilt  shew  thyself  unsavory."  "*' 

What  is  it  in  ourselves,  then,  that  enables  us  to 
apprehend  God  at  all,  however  variously  or  imper- 
fectly, and  makes  it  possible  to  ascertain  any  measure 
of  truth  about  Him.?  The  question  is  most  pertinent; 
and  an  analogy  may  help  us  to  answer  it. 

^^Heb.,  i:l. 

^11  Sam.  xxii:26,  27. 


64  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

We  are  endowed  with  five  physical  senses  by  means 
of  which  we  are  able  to  learn  something  of  the  physical 
world  lying  around  us  and  substantiating  itself  in  our 
bodies ;  and  it  is  conceivable  that,  if  we  had  twice  as 
many  senses,  we  might  learn  twice  as  much — so  that 
it  is  not  unreasonable  to  suppose  that  infinite  wonders 
and  glories  are  hidden  from  us,  not  because  they  do 
not  exist,  but  because  our  powers  of  apprehension  are 
so  limited !  Be  that  as  it  may,  these  five  physical  senses 
are  media  or  channels  or  tracts  through  which  the  ex- 
ternal world  conveys  its  phenomena  to  us,  sending  its 
messages  by  these  various  routes  to  the  central  Self 
within.  But  we  may  turn  the  statement  around  and 
say  that  these  senses  are  so  many  avenues  by  which 
the  soul  goes  forth  to  reach  and  explore  the  outward 
world;  or  that  they  are  so  many  windows  through 
which  the  soul  looks  out  upon  the  material  realm 
spreading  around  it.  Even  so  it  may  be  said  that 
there  are  spiritual  avenues  through  which  our  minds 
and  hearts  go  out,  as  it  were,  to  meet  the  King  of 
kings ;  or  that  there  are  spiritual  windows  through 
which  the  soul  of  man  looks  out  upon  a  psychical 
world,  lying  partly  within  but  mainly  without.  These 
spiritual  avenues  or  windows  may  be  properly  called 
spiritual  senses,  and  there  are  at  least  five  or  six  of 
them,  namely :  the  will,  the  reason,  the  moral  sense, 
the  ffisthetic  sense,  the  aff^ections,  and  the  religious 
sense.  These  are  not  so  many  departments  or  com- 
partments of  our  being,  nor  yet  separate  faculties  or 
capacities ;  but  are  rather  various  ways  in  which  the 
whole  Self,  receptive  and  responsive  and  active,  comes 
into  conscious  contact  with  the  facts  and  truths  of 
the  psychical  world,  the  spiritual  universe,  in  which 
it  exists  and  of  which  it  is  a  living  part. 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?         65 

In  most  men  some  one  of  these  powers  is  likely  to 
be  dominant.  In  one  man  it  is  the  will,  in  another  it 
is  the  reason,  in  another  the  moral  sense,  in  still  another 
the  esthetic  sense,  in  a  fifth  it  is  the  affections,  and  in 
the  sixth  the  religious  susceptibility.  Of  course  in 
the  greatest  men  there  is  a  happy  balance  or  a  har- 
monious working  of  all  these  endowments,  and  when 
developed  by  education  or  some  other  rich  experience 
they  produce  the  world's  true  leaders. 

Now  it  is  evident  that,  if  we  can  know  anything  at 
all  about  God  or  can  ascertain  any  truth  concerning 
Him,  it  must  be  by  the  exercise  of  one  or  more  of  these 
powers  in  ourselves.  By  virtue  of  the  will  in  us  we 
postulate  a  Supreme  Will  and  come  to  know  God  as 
Cause,  as  Dr.  Martineau  ably  argues  ;^^  by  the  power 
of  thought  in  us  we  come  to  know  Him  as  Intelligence, 
finding  the  marks  of  intelligence  throughout  the  uni- 
verse; by  the  moral  sense  in  us  we  apprehend  Him  as 
Moral  Ruler,  and  see  all  human  history  bearing  witness 
to  His  righteous  government  of  the  world;  by  the 
aesthetic  sense,  the  sense  of  beauty,  in  ourselves  we 
"behold  the  King  in  his  beauty";  by  the  instinct  of 
love  in  our  hearts  we  apprehend  Him  as  Supreme  Love ; 
and  by  the  religious  instinct,  the  spirit  of  holiness,  in 
us  we  feel  that  He  is  indeed  "the  Holy  One  that  in- 
habiteth  eternity,"  and  we  spontaneously  worship 
Him  "in  the  beauty  of  holiness."  Thus  we  look  out  of 
these  various  windows,  or  go  out  through  these  vari- 
ous avenues,  or  pursue  these  different  paths  in  our 
seeking  God,  "if  haply"  we  may  "feel  after  him  and 
find  him";  and  at  the  same  time  we  understand  that 
He  must  be  more  and  greater  than  we  can  hope  to 
find  in  any  of  these  ways, — more  and  greater  than  the 
"See  his  "Study  of  Religion,"  Vol.  I. 


66  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

sum  total  of  our  varied  apprehensions  of  Him  as  Ulti- 
mate Cause,  Supreme  Intelligence,  Moral  Governor, 
Perfect  Beauty,  Eternal  Love  and  the  All-Holy  One. 
But  we  use  these  expressions  and  follow  these  ways  be- 
cause they  are  the  best  that  are  available  to  us,  limited 
as  we  are,  in  our  attempt  to  know  God  and  to  tell  how 
we  know  Him. 

We  find  the  thought  of  God  in  ourselves.  How  it 
comes  to  be  with  us,  whether  by  tuition  or  by  intuition, 
we  may  not  agree;  that  is  to  say,  whether  it  has  been 
handed  down  to  us  by  our  ancestors  and  imparted  to 
us  by  our  associates,  or  is  innate  and  arises  sponta- 
neously within  us,  we  may  not  be  able  by  philosophy  or 
science  to  determine  positively.  While  it  is  undoubt- 
edly true  that  most  men  are  taught  the  idea  of  God, 
and  never  think  to  ask  themselves  how  otherwise  they 
could  derive  it,  yet  it  is  equally  true  that  many  of 
the  most  penetrating  minds  are  sure  beyond  perad- 
venture  that  this  idea  is  given  to  them  in  the  same  way 
that  self-consciousness  is  given.  One  writer  expresses 
the  latter  truth  as  follows: 

"The  only  answer  we  can  make,  when  we  ask  for  its 
origin,  is  that  our  thoughts  cannot  rise  higher  than 
their  source ;  that  our  Thought  of  God  can  have  no 
less  an  origin  than  the  Infinite,  Absolute  One;  that 
our  consciousness  of  God  must  come  from  God  himself, 
— the  Perfect  Reality.  The  very  fact  that  Man  thinks 
God  is,  if  we  trust  our  mental  laws  for  anything,  evi- 
dence of  the  Real  worth  of  the  Thought.  Beyond  this 
fact  reasoning  fails.  Intuition  must  enable  the  mind 
to  see,  if  it  shall  at  all  see,  the  offered  truth.  There 
is  no  proof  for  it  any  more  than  there  is  proof  for 
Self-Consciousness."  -^ 
^*  Rev.  Dr.  Clay  MacCauley,  "Memories  and  Memorials,"  p.  416. 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?  67 

But  however  originating,  we  find  ourselves  possess- 
ing the  thought  of  God  and  asking  ourselves  upon 
what  grounds  we  may  rest  our  belief  in  Him.  If  such 
belief  is  a  great,  complex  conviction,  to  which  many 
factors  contribute,  what  are  these  factors,  what  are 
the  evidences  which  support  our  faith?  If  our  faith 
in  God  is  reasonable,  it  will  be  worth  while  to  state 
the  principal  reasons  which  we  think  warrant  it. 

1.  Foremost  among  these  reasons  is  our  own  con- 
scious personal  existence.  This  is  the  center  from 
which  we  must  work  outward,  the  starting  point  for 
all  our  thought-excursions,  the  bedrock  upon  which  we 
must  lay  the  foundations  of  any  temple  of  faith,  hope 
and  love  that  we  may  seek  to  build.  And  we  are  abso- 
lutely sure  of  this.  Whatever  doubts  may  trouble  us 
concerning  other  things,  we  have  no  doubt  about  this ; 
we  know  that  we  are,  that  we  are  here,  that  we  are 
thinking  and  loving  beings,  and  that  our  selfhood 
persists  from  day  to  day.  We  know,  too,  that  we 
learn  and  grow  and  improve ;  that  we  have  wonderful 
memories,  insights,  inspirations  and  visions ;  that  we 
entertain  transcendent  ideas  and  cherish 

"thoughts  sublime  that  pierce  the  night  like  stars." 
We  are  aware  also  that  there  are  unplumbed  depths 
in  our  nature,  that  undeveloped  potentialities  lie  with- 
in us,  that  heights  of  character  to  which  we  have  not 
yet  attained  are  nevertheless  within  our  reach,  while 
intimations  of  beauty  and  gladness  still  awaiting  us 
are  ever  luring  our  hearts  onward  and  upward.  We 
know  our  own  virtues  and  our  own  faults  better  than 
any  one  else  can  know  them;  we  know  that  a  profound 
sense  of  right  and  wrong  possesses  and  commands  us ; 
we  know  that  a  spirit  of  holy  goodness  pleads  with 
our  souls ;  and  we  know  that  purity  and  impurity,  sin 


68  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

and  guilt,  remorse  and  penitence  and  pardon  are  not 
empty  words.  Thus  our  intellectual,  moral,  spiritual 
life,  yielding  its  varied  experiences  and  running  on 
from  year  to  year,  attests  our  abiding  yet  developing 
personality,  which  is  the  one  living  reality  of  which 
we  are  consciously  certain  in  a  world  of  change  and 
tumult  and  fathomless  mystery. 

2.  Being  thus  absolutely  sure  of  our  personal  exist- 
ence and  our  spiritual  nature,  we  turn  next  to  inquire 
how  we  have  come  to  be.  Here  we  immediately  enter 
a  vast  realm  of  new  truth.  For  the  scientific  learning 
of  mankind  has  been  so  completely  made  over  within 
the  last  hundred  years  that  our  explanation  of  man's 
place  in  nature  is  utterly  different  from  that  of  former 
times.  Modern  evolutionary  science  may  be  truly  said 
to  constitute  a  great,  new,  wonderful  revelation,  as 
significant  in  its  way  for  the  present  age  as  the  Chris- 
tian revelation  was  for  the  Augustan  age  of  the  Roman 
Empire;  it  has  given  us  literally  "new  heavens  and  a 
new  earth" ;  it  has  reconstructed  natural  history  and 
human  history;  and  it  has  enlarged  and  enriched  by 
many  degrees  our  understanding  of  the  marvelous 
processes  by  which  Humanity  has  been  produced.  As 
the  story  is  told,  for  instance,  in  the  late  Professor 
Henry  Drummond's  "The  Ascent  of  Man,"  or  in  one 
of  the  very  last  of  Mr.  John  Fiske's  little  books, 
"Through  Nature  to  God,"  it  is  dramatic,  impressive 
and  most  inspiring.  In  the  light  of  such  a  review  we 
see  a  process  of  progressive  development,  reaching 
through  uncounted  asons  of  time,  by  which  the  worlds 
were  formed,  by  which  the  earth  was  made  ready  for 
the  abode  of  life,  by  which  lower  and  then  higher  and 
still  higher  organisms  were  produced  wherein  life  mani- 
fested itself,  by  which  at  length  a  race  of  human  beings 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?         69 

appeared,  and  by  which  the  life  of  mankind  has  slowly 
unfolded,  expanded,  deepened,  and  risen  to  spiritual 
attainments  which  crown  it  all  with  glory  and  honor. 

It  is  the  function  of  science  primarily  to  deal  with 
phenomena,  to  explain  methods,  to  tell  how  the  changes 
of  the  universe  have  come  to  pass.  But  in  pursuing 
its  inquiries  touching  these  things,  it  finds  that  the 
universe  is  under  the  reign  of  law  and  order,  from 
which  caprice  and  chance  are  eliminated,  and  that  it 
is  animated  by  one  all-pervading  and  all-enduring 
Energy,  from  which  everything  proceeds,  to  which  at 
last  everything  can  be  traced  up.  When  the  question 
arises,  as  it  inevitably  does.  What  is  the  nature  of 
this  Energy.''  the  scientific  scholars  are  divided  in  their 
answers ;  one  group  saying.  We  do  not  know,  it  is  im- 
possible to  know;  another  group  saying,  The  only 
Energy  we  know  anything  about,  or  that  is  needed  to 
account  for  the  universe,  is  material;  and  yet  another 
group  saying.  The  ultimate  ground  or  substance  of 
the  universe  is  Spiritual  Life  or  Divine  Energy, — in 
the  words  of  Mr.  Fiske,  "The  infinite  and  eternal  Power 
that  is  manifested  in  every  pulsation  of  the  universe  is 
none  other  than  the  living  God."  ^^ 

3.  The  position  to  which  science  thus  leads,  yielding 
the  great  conceptions  of  Unity,  Energy,  Life  and  (in 
the  judgment  of  many  scholars)  Spirituality  as  the 
everlasting  Source  of  phenomena,  the  Final  Reality  in 
the  universe,  is  substantiated  by  Philosophy.  For  it 
is  the  function  of  Philosophy  to  deal  with  the  facts  of 
mind,  intelligence,  spirituality,  as  these  are  disclosed 
primarily  in  human  life.  It  studies  these  in  relation 
to  the  whole  problem  of  man's  existence,  and  thus  deals 
also  with  facts  lying  outside  of  the  human  realm,  so 

=»  "The  Idea  of  God,"  etc.,  p.  166, 


70  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

that  it  takes  the  materials  and  conclusions  of  science, 
and  builds  out  of  them  its  systems  of  truth.  Now  the 
facts  of  mind,  intelligence,  spirituality,  everywhere 
found  in  human  life,  are  as  real  as  any  other  facts 
in  the  world;  they  are  as  substantial  as  the  facts  of 
the  sun,  moon  and  stars,  or  those  of  the  solid  earth ; 
and  they  may  point  as  clearly  in  their  own  way  to 
certain  great  ends  and  meanings  as  do  the  facts  of 
astronomy  or  geology  or  biology.  It  is  simply  a  ques- 
tion of  rightly  interpreting  or  construing  them. 

And  in  what  direction  do  these  great  facts  of  human 
life  point  .^^  Here  we  have,  in  ourselves,  a  first-hand 
knowledge  of  them,— mind,  intelligence,  spirituality ; 
thought,  will,  conscience ;  love,  benevolence,  reverence. 
What  do  they  signify?  Surely  they  spring  out  of 
some  source  not  less  than  ourselves.  Personality  in  us 
must  originate  in  something  not  less  than  Personality 
in  the  universe  to  which  we  belong.  If  that  "some- 
thing" is  vastly  higher  and  greater  than  any  per- 
sonality that  we  have  ever  known,  well  and  good !  our 
own  personality  shall  be  but  a  hint  or  symbol  of  such 
a  Transcendent  Deity ;  and  our  poor  language  will  not 
enable  us  to  do  better  than  to  call  Him,  therefore,  the 
Supreme  Spiritual  Personality,  the  Living  God. 

4.  We  may  take  a  further  step  by  glancing  at  the 
providence  of  human  history.  The  Power  which  fills 
the  universe  is  a  Living  Power;  it  manifests  itself  in 
our  bodies  in  the  physical  life  which  we  possess ;  it 
wells  up  in  our  souls  in  our  conscious  personality,  in 
the  forms  of  mind,  intelligence,  conscience,  volition, 
affection,  veneration,  aspiration.  But  it  is  the  very 
same  Power  that  has  been  a  "Governor  among  the 
nations."  For  a  mighty  moral  energy  has  always 
stirred  the  souls  of  men,  and  disturbed  them  and  im- 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?  71 

pelled  them,  or  restrained  and  corrected  them,  and  has 
thereby  so  overruled  affairs  and  events  and  develop- 
ments as  to  "make  for  righteousness"  in  the  long  run. 
By  virtue  of  this  moral  energy  resident  in  Humanity, 
evils  are  slowly  outgrown,  wrongs  are  at  length  recog- 
nized and  overthrown,  rights  are  finally  perceived  and 
established,  and  an  ever-widening  range  is  given  to  the 
principles  of  justice,  mercy  and  benevolence.  Thus 
there  is  such  a  thing  as  moral  progress  in  the  history 
of  mankind,  tedious  and  painful  though  it  be ;  and 
great  moral  leaders  are  raised  up,  and  stupendous 
events  culminate  in  moral  victories — like  the  uprooting 
of  slavery  by  our  Civil  War — and  the  work  of  right- 
eousness becomes  peace,  and  the  effect  of  righteousness 
quietness  and  assurance  forever.  The  very  protest 
which  millions  of  people  are  making  to-day  against 
the  frightful  wrongs  of  the  world  is  itself  the  clearest 
proof  of  the  depth  and  strength  of  this  moral  energy 
that  lives  and  grows  in  the  souls  of  men;  and  out  of 
protest  will  come  ultimately  correction  and  reconstruc- 
tion. 

Now  this  moral  energy  upspringing  within  each  one 
of  us,  to  which  none  of  us  can  be  wholly  oblivious,  for- 
ever prompting  or  checking  us,  now  giving  its  august 
sanctions  to  our  behavior  and  now  administering  its 
solemn  rebuke  even  to  our  thought  of  wrong-doing, — 
whence  is  it  derived.'^  Surely  it  is  not  of  our  own 
creating;  neither  is  it  altogether  begotten  by  the 
human  society  that  surrounds  us — it  is  merely 
"brought  forth"  thus:  but  rather  we  must  say  that 
our  own  moral  sentiments,  and  those  of  our  fellow 
men  around  us,  expressed  and  crystallized  in  the  just 
laws  of  organized  civil  society,  are  a  manifestation  and 
an  index  of  the  moral  character  of  the  Government  of 


72  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

the  universe;  and  this  is  tantamount  to  saying  that 
that  Government  is  a  Divine  Government.  Thus  the 
moral  law  written  in  our  hearts  becomes  perhaps  the 
very  deepest  and  surest  witness  which  is  borne  to  us 
concerning  the  immediate  presence  in  our  human  world 
and  in  each  human  life  of  the  Supreme  Power  that 
Doctor  Martineau  described  as  "a  Divine  Mind  and 
WiU  ruling  the  universe,  and  holding  moral  relations 
with  mankind." 

5.  Still  another  element  of  our  faith  in  God,  another 
method  of  learning  the  truth  about  Him,  another  means 
of  apprehending  Him,  is  afforded  by  the  experiences 
of  those  spiritually  sensitized  souls  that  have  been 
awakened  and  illumined  in  an  unusual  way  or  to  an 
unusual  degree.  It  were  as  vain  to  deny  that  there 
are  such  souls  as  to  deny  that  there  are  poets  and 
musicians,  and  it  were  as  foolish  to  ignore  the  facts 
of  which  they  testify  as  to  say  that  the  visions  of  the 
poet  or  the  musician  are  not  worth  noticing.  "The 
exceptional  experiences  of  exceptional  men,"  as  Dean 
Hodges  speaks  of  them,  may  be  as  valid  and  significant 
as  the  ordinary  experiences  of  ordinary  men.  It  is 
simply  a  question  of  verifying  and  interpreting  them. 
It  is  no  more  strange  that  "the  pure  in  heart"  should 
"see  God"  than  that  a  mathematical  genius  should  in- 
stantly read  the  sum  total  of  an  extensive  column  of 
figures.  Men  and  women  who  are  gifted  by  nature 
with  intuitive  perception,  having  clear  and  deep  in- 
sight and  delicate  feelings,  and  who  perhaps  have  been 
chastened  by  sorrow  and  tempered  by  suflPering,  learn- 
ing lessons  of  submission,  obedience,  trust  and  love, 
and  living  in  the  spirit  of  prayer  and  adoration,  may 
be  surely  expected  to  find  evidences  of  the  presence 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?         78 

and  power  of  God  in  the  world  and  in  their  own  lives 
which  coarser  people  cannot  possibly  understand.  In- 
deed it  is  always  upon  life's  higher  levels  that  we 
naturally  look  for  those  experiences  which  shall  make 
us  aware  of  God.  To  be  sure,  we  may  not  entirely 
escape  Him  upon  life's  lower  levels,  because  His  provi- 
dence of  law  and  order  still  enfolds  us  and  holds  us 
in  its  grasp  and  disciplines  us ;  but  it  is  mainly  in 
the  upper  regions,  above  the  mists  and  miasmas  of 
evil,  where  the  air  is  pure  and  the  sunlight  is  clear, 
where  truth  and  love  and  goodness  and  freedom  have 
opportunity  to  bear  their  legitimate  sway, — it  is 
mainly  there,  where  the  holiest  men  and  women  seek 
constantly  to  dwell,  that  the  human  soul  may  most 
confidently  hope  to  hold  communion  with  God.  Thus 
the  saints  do  certainly  have  something  to  teach  us 
which  we  may  not  otherwise  learn,  namely :  that  a  deep, 
vital,  inner  piety,  a  simple  but  sincere  love  in  the  heart, 
an  open  mind,  an  obedient  will,  a  reverent  and  yearn- 
ing but  submissive  spirit,  "meek  and  lowly,  pure  and 
holy,"  may  bring  us  into  a  blessed  consciousness  of 
the  Divine  Presence,  so  that  we  shall  feel  the  tides  of 
the  Divine  Life  flowing  into  us  and  through  us,  when 
nothing  else  can  yield  us  so  great  a  joy.  This  is  the 
message  of  the  Christian  mystic;  yea,  it  is  the  most 
central  and  essential  truth  lying  at  the  heart  of  all 
spiritual  religion ;  and  all  our  external  searchings, 
whether  by  science  or  philosophy  or  ceremonial  ob- 
servances, will  find  their  culmination  and  their  satis- 
faction when  they  lead  to  this  profound  yet  childlike 
spiritual  attitude.  God  is  not  so  surely  found  at  the 
end  of  a  logical  syllogism  as  in  a  life  of  faithful  de- 
votion to  duty  in  the  spirit  of  reverent  gratitude,  trust 
and  love. 


74  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

"O  Power,  more  near  my  life  than  life  itself 
(Or  what  seems  life  to  us  in  sense  immured). 
Even  as  the  roots,  shut  in  the  darksome  earth. 
Share  in  tlie  tree-top's  joyance,  and  conceive 
Of  sunshine  and  wide  air  and  winged  things 
By  sympathy  of  nature,  so  do  I 
Have  evidence  of  Thee  so  far  above. 
Yet  in  and  of  me!     Rather  Thou  the  root 
Invisibly  sustaining,  hid  in  light. 
Not  darkness,  or  in  darkness  made  by  us. 
If  sometimes  I  must  hear  good  men  debate 
Of  other  witness  of  Thyself  than  Thou, 
As  if  there  needed  any  help  of  ours 
To  nurse  Thy  flickering  life,  that  else  must  cease. 
Blown  out,  as  'twere  a  candle,  by  men's  breath, 
My  soul  shall  not  be  taken  in  their  snare. 
To  change  her  inward  surety  for  their  doubt 
Muffled  from  sight  in  formal  robes  of  proof: 
While  she  can  only  feel  herself  through  Thee, 
I  fear  not  Thy  withdrawal;  more  I  fear. 
Seeing,  to  know  Thee  not,  hoodwinked  with  dreams 
Of  signs  and  wonders,  while,  unnoticed.  Thou, 
Walking  Thy  garden  still,  commun'st  with  men, 
Missed  in  the  commonplace  of  miracle."  *" 

6.  "Canst  thou  by  searching  find  out  God.^  Canst 
thou  find  out  the  Ahnighty  unto  perfection.?"  asks 
one  of  the  characters  in  the  Book  of  Job.^^ 

Jeremiah  represents  the  Lord  as  saying,  "Then 
shall  ye  call  upon  me,  and  ye  shall  go  and  pray  unto 
me,  and  I  will  hearken  unto  you.  And  ye  shall  seek 
me,  and  find  me,  when  ye  shall  search  for  me  with  all 
your  heart."  ^^ 

"No  man  hath  seen  God  at  any  time,"  says  the 
author  of  the  First  Epistle  of  John.  "If  we  love  one 
another,  God  dwelleth  in  us,  and  his  love  is  perfected 
in  us.  .  .  .  God  is  love;  and  he  that  dwelleth  in  love 
dwelleth  in  God,  and  God  in  him.    He  that  loveth  not, 

«» Lowell,  The  Cathedral. 
^Soh  xi.7,  Jer.  xxix.l2,  13. 
=2Jer.  xxix.l2,  13. 


WHAT  CAN  WE  KNOW  OF  GOD?  75 

knoweth  not  God;  for  God  Is  love.  .  .  .  Hereby  know 
we  that  we  dwell  in  him,  and  he  in  us,  because  he  hath 
given  us  of  his  Spirit."  ^^ 

To  kindred  purport  are  the  remarks  of  St.  Paul, — 
"The  Spirit  itself  beareth  witness  with  our  spirit,  that 
we  are  children  of  God."  ^^  "And  because  ye  are  sons, 
God  hath  sent  forth  the  Spirit  of  his  Son  into  your 
hearts,  crying,  Abba,  Father."  ^^ 

Finally,  Jesus  said,  "Blessed  are  the  pure  in  heart; 
for  they  shall  see  God."  ^^  "If  any  man  will  do  his 
will,  he  shall  know  of  the  doctrine,  whether  it  be  of 
God,  or  I  speak  of  myself."  ^^ 

These  expressions  register  the  high-water  mark  of 
spiritual  truth  in  the  Hebrew  and  Christian  Scriptures. 
They  not  only  represent  man's  deep  yearning  for  God, 
but  point  out  the  one  sure  way  of  finding  Him,  namely : 
the  way  of  a  spiritual  life,  the  way  of  a  devout,  loving, 
obedient  attitude  of  mind  and  heart.  Thus  they  con- 
firm the  supreme  lesson  which  we  have  been  slowly 
learning,  that  God  is  to  be  found  and  known  mainly 
within  the  human  soul  rather  than  without, — a  lesson 
which  is  finely  set  forth  in  Frederick  L.  Hosmer's 
beautiful  poem: 

"Go  not,  my  soul,  in  search  of  Him: 
Thou  wilt  not  find  Him  there, — 
Or  in  the  depths  of  shadow  dim. 
Or  heights  of  upper  air. 

For  not  in  far-off  realms  of  space 

The  Spirit  hath  its  throne; 
In  every  heart  it  findeth  place 

And  waiteth  to  be  known. 

23  1  Jolin  iv:13,  16,  8,  13. 

^*  Rom.  viii:16. 

35  Gal.  iv:6. 

3«Matt.  v:8. 

3' St.  John  vii:17. 


76  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

Thought  answereth  alone  to  thought, 
And  soul  with  soul  hath  kin; 

The  outward  God  he  findeth  not, 
Who  finds  not  God  within. 

And  if  the  vision  come  to  thee 

Revealed  by  inward  sign. 
Earth  will  be  full  of  Deity 

And  with  His  glory  shine. 

Thou  shalt  not  want  for  company, 

Nor  pitch  thy  tent  alone; 
The  indwelling  God  will  go  with  thee. 

And  show  thee  of  His  own. 

Oh  gift  of  gifts,  oh  grace  of  grace. 
That  God  should  condescend 

To  make  thy  heart  His  dwelling  place, 
And  be  thy  daily  Friend! 

'  Then  go  not  thou  in  search  of  Him, 
But  to  thyself  repair; 
Wait  thou  within  the  silence  dim. 
And  thou  shalt  find  Him  there." 


IV 

WHAT   SHALL  WE   BELIEVE  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY? 

EVERY  thoughtful  person  must  be  interested  in 
the  subject  of  immortality.  It  is  a  matter  of 
such  direct,  personal  concern  to  each  human 
being  that  it  easily  commands  the  earnest  attention  of 
the  enlightened  and  sincere,  while  it  cannot  be  utterly 
and  permanently  ignored  by  any.  Even  if  no  other 
influence  draws  one  to  it,  the  silent  processes  of  nature, 
— the  lapse  of  time,  the  progress  of  life,  the  waning 
of  physical  energy, — must  soon  bring  one  face  to  face 
with  the  old  question,  "If  a  man  die,  shall  he  live 
again?"  Although  we  may  naturally  and  properly 
be  absorbed  mainly  in  the  things  which  are  now  and 
here,  yet  we  quickly  discover  that  the  order  of  life 
makes  the  present  relate  to  the  future;  so  that,  while 
we  should,  indeed,  "be  not  anxious  for  the  morrow," 
we  should  be  prudent  enough  to  take  the  morrow  into 
some  account, — at  least  to  consider  whether  there  shall 
be  any  morrow  at  all.  In  other  words,  we  cannot  dis- 
guise the  fact  that  human  life  and  the  world  containing 
it  are  not  stationary,  but  in  process,  belonging  to  a 
vast,  continuous  system  of  progressive  change ;  so  that 
the  ultimate  questions,  W^hence,  whither  and  where- 
fore? must  ever  be  the  transcendently  important  ques- 
tions for  the  mind  and  heart  of  man. 

Therefore  no  serious  consideration  of  modern  re- 
ligious problems  can  omit  a  study  of  the  evidences  for 
a  future  life.     To  be  sure,  the  subject  does  not  concern 

77 


78  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

religion  alone;  it  is  more  or  less  germane  to  philos- 
ophy also,  and  does  not  lie  entirely  beyond  the  pur- 
view of  science.  Yet  the  intellectual  atmosphere  of 
our  time  is  so  full  of  Christian  influences,  and  Chris- 
tian teaching  has  always  so  definitely  implied  a  belief 
in  immortality,  that  we  can  hardly  separate  the  subject 
from  the  other  great  themes  of  spiritual  religion.  The 
truth  disclosed  by  a  candid  inquiry  into  the  nature  of 
religion,  the  validity  of  faith,  the  being  of  God,  the 
character  of  Christ,  and  the  value  of  the  Bible  nat- 
urally leads  us  to  ask  what  can  be  thought  about 
human  destiny.  The  interest  awakened  by  these  other 
lines  of  research  logically  culminates  in  this  question 
as  to  the  final  outcome  of  our  existence;  and  we  feel 
that  the  encouragement  afforded  by  a  fair  review  of 
the  spiritual  development  of  the  race  ought  to  issue 
in  a  firmer  confidence  in  personal  immortality,  or  else 
the  whole  process  must  prove  disappointing,  and  the 
mystery  of  life  will  be  not  only  deeper  but  darker  than 
ever. 

At  the  same  time  we  are  disposed  to  scrutinize  more 
closely  than  formerly  the  reasons  advanced  for  the 
support  of  such  a  faith.  We  are  not  satisfied  to  ac- 
cept a  doctrine  merely  because  it  is  a  sacred  tradition 
hoary  with  age,  or  because  it  is  sanctioned  by  a  vener- 
able and  mighty  institution,  or  because  it  is  taught  in 
the  Holy  Scriptures,  or  even  because  it  is  intertwined 
with  the  dearest  affections  and  hopes  of  the  human 
heart.  All  these  considerations  may  create  a  pre- 
sumption in  its  favor,  and  we  shall  respect  it  accord- 
ingly; but  they  do  not  necessarily  establish  its  truth. 
Indeed,  there  is  a  vague  suspicion  in  many  minds  that 
the  discoveries  of  modern  science  and  the  critical  think- 
ing   of    recent    years    have    invalidated    most    of    the 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  79 

arguments  heretofore  made  in  behalf  of  the  great  belief 
in  a  future  life.  Therefore  we  want  to  go  over  the 
whole  ground  again,  feeling  our  way  at  every  step, 
and  examining  more  thoroughly  every  position;  and 
especially  we  want  to  hear  how  the  ease  stands  in  the 
light  of  present  knowledge. 

Such  at  least  is  the  attitude  of  earnest  minds.  Of 
course  those  who  are  not  earnest  may  dismiss  it  with 
the  flippant  assumption  that  nobody  can  know  any- 
thing respecting  this  matter,  and  there  is  no  use  in 
thinking  much  about  it  anyway;  and  perhaps  many 
others,  like  Gallic,  "care  for  none  of  these  things." 
Absorbed  in  the  life  that  now  is,  comfortable  and 
liappy,  and  content,  as  they  think,  to  take  "one  world 
at  a  time,"  they  are  not  conscious  of  any  strong  desire 
to  live  in  another  state  of  being.  But  for  those  who 
lift  up  their  eyes  to  look  out  upon  the  universe  in 
solemn  wonder,  and  who  reflect  upon  the  nature  of 
man  and  the  deeper  meanings  of  experience;  and  espe- 
cially for  those  whose  pathways  have  been  over- 
shadowed by  the  sorrow  of  bereavement,  and  whose 
love  has  followed  into  the  darkness  the  fading  vision 
of  a  dear  life,  longing  constantly 

".  .  .  for  the  touch  of  a  vanished  hand. 
And  the  sound  of  a  voice  that  Is  still," 

the  subject  must  have  an  interest  unspeakably  sacred 
and  profound.-  They  may  be  sad,  perplexed  and  doubt- 
ful, but  they  are  neither  shallow  nor  insincere ;  and 
they  wait  for  the  light  of  indisputable  truth  as  only 
they  can  wait  and  watch  who  feel  that  all  the  true 
glory  of  life  is  involved  in  this  one  paramount  issue. 

It  is  pertinent  to  remark  here  that  the  belief  in 
immortality,  when  worthily  held,  is  linked  with  the 
very  noblest  aspirations  of  the  human  soul.  It  may  be 


80  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

held  unworthily,  indeed,  being  merely  a  form  of  selfish- 
ness, the  selfish  desire  for  continuance,  without  refer- 
ence to  purification;  and  perhaps  it  is  all  too  fre- 
quently held  so.  But  when  it  is  cherished  thoughtfully, 
devoutly,  sublimely,  with  a  humble  and  contrite  heart, 
and  yet  with  a  valiant  conviction  of  the  eternal 
supremacy  of  righteousness,  it  is  bound  up,  not  only 
with  our  deepest  love,  but  also  with  our  holiest  prayers : 
we  crave  immortality  not  so  much  for  ourselves  as  for 
those  who  are  far  better  than  we,  and  for  the  sake  of 
the  triumph  of  good  over  evil  in  ourselves,  in  others, 
in  the  wide  universe.  Even  if  the  prospect  of  our  own 
final  extinction  did  not  trouble  us,  the  thought  that 
our  dear  ones  who  have  left  us  have  entirely  perished 
were  almost  unbearable.  As  Dr.  George  A.  Gordon 
puts  it,  "A  true  man  does  not  fear  death  for  himself, 
but  for  his  friends ;  it  is  not  his  own  grave  that  is 
dreadful,  but  the  grave  of  those  whom  he  loves.  .  .  . 
Not  what  becomes  of  us  when  we  die,  but  what  becomes 
of  them  when  they  die  is  the  great  question  of  human 
love.  .  .  .  We  so  value,  not  ourselves,  but  our  beloved 
dead,  that  we  cannot  think  of  them  as  lost  to  us,  lost 
to  the  universe,  lost  to  God."  And  so  Tennyson  urges 
the  question, — 

"The  faith  that  of  the  living  whole 

No   life  shall   fail   beyond   the   grave, 
Derives  it  not  from  what  we  have 
The  Ukest  God  within  the  soul?"^' 

It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  dwell  upon  the  prevalence 
of  the  belief  in  a  future  life,  or  to  inquire  much  further 
as  to  its  origin.  The  broad  fact  may  be  granted  at 
once  that  it  has  been  entertained  by  the  vast  majority 
of  mankind,   although  many  notable  exceptions  have 

'"  In  Memoriam,  LI V. 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  81 

occurred,  and  a  very  high  type  of  religion  has  sub- 
sisted without  it,  as  among  the  Hebrews ;  and  we  may 
concede  that  it  springs  spontaneously  out  of  the  in- 
stinctive feelings,  aspirations  and  convictions  of  the 
soul.  In  the  words  of  James  Freeman  Clarke,  "not 
only  all  primitive  religions,  but  all  the  great  ethnic 
religions,  have  awakened  in  man's  soul  the  same  belief 
in  a  future  life.  It  is  the  instinct  of  consciousness 
which  creates  this  faith.  Man,  as  a  conscious  personal 
being,  a  center  of  life,  feeling  himself  to  be  a  thinking, 
feeling,  and  choosing  person,  sees  no  reason  why  he 
should  cease  to  exist  when  his  body  is  dissolved.  .  .  . 
And  the  more  full  of  life  he  is,  the  less  fear  of  death 
he  has.  This  is  the  evidence  of  those  who  trust  to 
their  instincts.  They  have  faith  in  immortality  because 
it  is  natural  to  believe  in  it.     They  are  made  so."  ^^ 

Of  course  the  significance  of  a  statement  like  this 
depends  altogether  upon  the  value  of  human  instincts. 
The  question  immediately  arises  whether  these  are  as 
reliable  as  the  processes  of  reasoning.  Perhaps  we 
cannot  determine  this  point  exactly,  but  we  are  learn- 
ing to-day  to  attach  more  importance  to  instinct  than 
was  formerly  done.  We  see  that  the  instincts  of  any 
given  creature  are  the  surest  indication  of  its  nature 
that  we  can  have.  The  instinct  which  carries  a  duck 
into  the  water,  or  an  eagle  into  the  air,  or  a  new-born 
babe  to  its  mother's  breast,  or  a  youth  and  maiden  into 
the  marriage  relation,  or  a  race  into  acts  of  worship 
is  a  clearer  proof  of  natural  forces  and  laws,  in  each 
instance,  than  any  a  priori  reasoning  could  afford.  In- 
stinct, in  fact,  is  the  voice  of  universal  nature  speaking 
in  and  through  the  particular  case.  When  a  little 
baby  girl  fondles  and  caresses  her  doU,  loving  it  almost 

^'''Ten  Great  Religions,"  Vol.  II,  p.  336. 


82  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

as  really  and  strongly  as  her  parents  love  her,  she  is 
simply  acting  out  her  natural  maternal  instinct;  and 
the  motherhood  of  the  whole  human  race  may  be  said 
to  be  speaking  in  and  through  her  in  that  act.  She 
herself  cannot  understand  it,  intellectually,  reflectively, 
scientifically ;  but  older  people  do  because  they  have 
learned  more  fully  the  meaning  of  all  such  things. 
So  it  is,  doubtless,  with  us  in  our  instinctive  belief  in 
God  and  immortality:  we  may  not  be  mature  enough 
yet,  we  may  not  have  risen  high  enough  in  the  scale 
of  experience,  to  comprehend  the  whole  significance  of 
this  deep  voice  of  nature  speaking  in  and  through  us ; 
but  by  and  by,  when  we  shall  have  advanced  further 
in  our  development,  here  or  elsewhere,  we  may  per- 
ceive that  such  an  instinctive  belief  or  aspiration  was 
as  sure  an  indication  of  the  reality  toward  which  it 
pointed  as  the  web-foot  of  the  duck  is  an  index  of  its 
watery  home,  or  as  the  motherly  aff'ection  of  the  little 
girl  for  her  doll  is  a  sign  of  her  own  latent  or  poten- 
tial maternity.  Certainly,  in  the  light  of  evolution, 
such  a  consideration  is  not  to  be  despised;  for  evolu- 
tion shows  us  that  back  of  every  man  stands  the  whole 
human  race,  and  back  of  the  human  race  lies  the  un- 
folding order  of  the  infinite  universe. 

But  granting  the  prevalence  and  the  prophecy  of 
this  instinctive  belief  in  immortality,  can  we  verify  it, 
i.  e.,  can  we  prove  it  to  the  intellect.?  This  is  the 
crucial  question.  And  frankly  the  answer  must  be  No, 
if  by  the  term  proof  we  mean  mathematical  demonstra- 
tion. The  utmost  that  we  can  do  is  to  establish  a  very 
high  degree  of  probability,  or  to  produce  the  strongest 
possible  conviction,  so  that  one  man  may  believe  with 
all  his  mind  and  heart,  but  still  cannot  make  another 
believe.     Hence    he   who    dogmatizes    on    the    subject, 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  83 

whether  he  take  his  cue  from  the  Scriptures  or  the 
doctrinal  systems  of  the  theologians  or  the  misgivings 
of  the  agnostics,  is  inexcusable.  The  only  proper 
attitude  is  one  of  candor,  open-mindedness  and  fear- 
lessness, seeking  "the  truth,  the  whole  truth,  and 
nothing  but  the  truth." 

But  if  the  affirmative  of  the  question  cannot  be  in- 
controvertibly  established,  neither  can  the  negative. 
To  deny  human  immortality  because  we  do  not  know 
that  the  soul  survives  the  dissolution  of  the  body,  would 
be  like  saying  that  there  are  no  more  comets  in  the 
universe  than  have  been  discovered  and  recorded  be- 
cause we  do  not  know  of  the  existence  of  such ;  or  it 
would  be  like  saying  that  there  certainly  are  no  in- 
telligent inhabitants  of  other  worlds  than  ours  because 
we  have  no  knowledge  of  them.  The  difficulty  of  prov- 
ing a  universal  negative  is  understood  by  all  logicians. 
Plainly  we  need  to  remember  our  limitations  in  dealing 
with  this  subject.  We  have  only  five  physical  senses 
through  which  to  apprehend  the  material  world:  sup- 
pose we  had  ten:  we  might  then  learn  twice  as  much 
about  it  as  we  are  now  able  to  do.^*^  We  have  had  only 
a  brief  personal  experience  by  which  to  apprehend  the 
realities  of  the  spiritual  world:  suppose  the  range  of 
our  intellectual,  ethical  and  religious  life  were  doubled 
in  length,  depth  and  intensity:  we  surely  might  under- 
stand twice  as  much  as  we  do  now  of  the  forces  and 

*"Mr.  Edison  is  quoted  as  having  said:  "There  are  lots  of  things 
besides  radium  we  do  not  understand.  These  five  senses  of  ours 
are  pretty  poor  detectives.  We  perceive  only  a  little  that  comes 
within  the  range  of  our  senses.  A  thing  drops  below  their  level  and 
we  do  not  perceive  it.  Here  and  there,  now  and  then,  some  one 
finds  a  new  thing  of  which  we  did  not  dream  the  existence.  In  this 
room  at  this  minute  there  are  fifty  wireless  messages  going 
through.  Without  instruments  we  cannot  detect  them." — Dr. 
Johonnot  in  The  Universalist  Leader,  Mar.  12,  1910. 


84  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

laws  and  possibilities  of  the  spiritual  universe.  So 
perhaps  the  relation  of  the  soul  to  the  body,  and  of 
both  to  the  cosmical  order,  may  be  more  fully  revealed 
to  us  sometime,  in  the  light  of  increased  learning  or 
when  we  shall  have  risen  out  of  this  present  realm,  than 
it  is  now.  These  are  mere  conjectures,  to  be  sure;  but 
they  are  entirely  reasonable,  and  they  prepare  us  to 
meet  the  chief  difficulty  which  the  problem  of  immor- 
tality appears  to  involve,  viz.,  the  question  whether 
life  is  not  simply  a  form  or  manifestation  of  material 
energy,  and  whether  therefore  the  soul  is  not  wholly 
dependent  upon  the  body. 

It  is  at  this  point  that  scientific  doubts  come  in. 
The  biologist  sees  life  always  in  connection  with  some 
physical  organism ;  he  knows  nothing  of  it  elsewhere ; 
he  dissects  every  tissue,  microscopically  examines  every 
cell,  analyzes  every  chemical  compound,  and  never  dis- 
covers any  soul  or  spirit,  in  plant,  animal  or  man,  that 
he  can  gauge  by  any  of  his  instruments  or  that  re- 
mains after  the  organism  is  dissolved :  therefore  it  is 
easy  for  him  to  believe  that  life  is  merely  a  form  of 
material  energy,  a  mode  of  motion,  like  a  flame  at  the 
gas-jet,  and  that  what  we  call  the  human  soul  is  only 
a  blossom  on  the  tree  of  our  purely  physical  nature. 
Moreover,  he  studies  the  workings  of  man's  brain,  and 
discovers  a  series  of  molecular  changes  occurring  simul- 
taneously with  the  passing  of  ideas,  thoughts  or 
emotions  through  the  mind;  and  then  he  wonders 
whether  the  molecular  changes  may  not  be  the  cause, 
and  the  only  knowable  cause,  of  such  ideas,  thoughts 
and  emotions.  This  aspect  of  the  case  is  well  stated 
by  Harry  Emerson  Fosdick  as  follows : 

"The  modern  laboratory  study  of  the  physical  basis 
of  personality  most  urges  this  query  on  us.     There  is 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  85 

no  longer  any  doubt  about  the  facts  to  be  interpreted. 
A  continuous  layer  of  gray  matter,  varying  in  thick- 
ness from  one-twelfth  to  one-eighth  of  an  inch,  and 
folded  upon  itself  'as  one  would  crumple  up  a  handker- 
chief,' forms  the  outer  surface  of  our  brains.  No 
thinking  is  ever  done  by  men  without  the  cooperation 
of  this  delicate  and  highly  organized  nervous  tissue. 
Each  psychical  function  has  some  special  lobe  or  con- 
volution in  the  gray  matter,  without  which  the  corre- 
sponding mental  activity  is  utterly  impossible.  In 
many  cases  the  exact  location  of  the  sensitive  surface, 
where  the  special  forces  of  intellectual  activity  are 
carried  on,  is  known  to  the  psychologists.  They  know 
the  area  of  the  brain  with  which  we  hear,  the  area 
with  which  we  see ;  they  know  the  lobes  by  which  we 
move  our  arms  and  legs,  our  lips  and  tongues  and 
eyes ;  they  know  the  convolution  where  the  function  of 
speech  is  carried  on  and  without  which  abstract  think- 
ing is  impossible.  They  can  even  distinguish  the  sur- 
face with  which  we  hear  words  from  the  surface  with 
which  we  read  them.  Nothing  is  clearer  than  that  for 
every  functioning  of  the  minds  of  men  there  is  a  corre- 
sponding molecular  activity  in  the  gray  matter  of  the 
brain.  The  conclusion  at  first  seems  inevitable  that 
the  mind  is  absolutely  dependent  on  the  physical  struc- 
ture and  is  inseparable  from  it."  ^^ 

Now  with  reference  to  these  facts  it  is  not  for  one 
to  speak  as  a  scientist  who  knows  little  of  science;  but 
it  is  certainly  proper  to  observe  that  they  have  been 
duly  considered  by  many  eminent  scholars,  both  scien- 
tists and  philosophers,  thoroughly  competent  to  pass 
judgment  upon  them,  who  have  not  found  in  them  an 
insuperable  barrier  to  an  earnest  faith  in  immortality. 
*^"The  Assurance  of  Immortality,"  pp.  7T-79   (1914). 


86  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

Perhaps  the  words  of  Professor  Tyndall  are  as  weighty 
as  any  that  have  been  uttered  regarding  this  problem: 

"Granted  that  a  definite  thought  and  a  definite  molec- 
ular action  in  the  brain  occur  simultaneously,  we  do 
not  possess  the  organ,  nor,  apparently,  any  rudiment 
of  the  organ,  which  would  enable  us  to  pass  by  a 
process  of  reasoning  from  one  phenomenon  to  the 
other.  They  appear  together,  but  we  do  not  know 
why."  "The  passage  from  the  physics  of  the  brain 
to  the  corresponding  facts  of  consciousness  is  unthink- 
able." "The  problem  of  the  connection  of  the  body 
and  the  soul  is  as  insoluble  as  it  was  in  the  pre-scien- 
tific  ages."  *^  While  this  language  does  not  commit 
Professor  Tyndall  to  a  belief  in  immortality,  it  clearly 
does  not  forbid  such  a  belief ;  and  it  goes  far  to  warrant 
the  emphatic  remark  of  Mr.  John  Fiske  to  the  effect 
that  "the  materialistic  assumption  that  the  life  of  the 
soul  ends  with  the  life  of  the  body,  is  perhaps  the  most 
colossal  instance  of  baseless  assumption  that  is  known 
to  the  history  of  philosophy." 

It  appears,  then,  that  the  essential  truth  is  simply 
this :  As  far  as  our  experience  goes  in  this  world,  the 
action  of  the  mind  and  the  action  of  the  brain  occur 
together;  but  no  man  knows  enough  of  the  ultimate 
nature  of  either  mind  or  matter  to  tell  why  it  must  be 
so — we  only  know  that  it  is  so.  To  say  that  the  action 
of  the  mind  is  produced  by  the  action  of  the  brain 
seems  like  "putting  the  cart  before  the  horse,"  or  like 
saying  that  the  instrument  which  a  telegraph  operator 
uses  in  transmitting  a  message  produces  the  thought 
which  lies  in  his  mind,  instead  of  the  thought  and  the 
action  of  his  will  producing  the  clicking  of  the  machine. 
Indeed,  here  is  precisely  the  vital  difference  between 

**  Quoted  by  Washington  Gladden  in  "Burning  Questions,"  p.  142. 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  87 

the  materialistic  and  the  spiritualistic  construction  of 
the  problem :  the  former  avers  that  the  physical  organ- 
ism produces  what  we  call  mind,  soul,  spirit,  as  a  rose- 
bush produces  the  beauty  and  fragrance  of  its  flowers ; 
while  the  latter  contends  that  the  physical  organism 
is  merely  the  temporary  tenement,  vehicle  and  instru- 
ment of  the  living  spiritual  personality,  which  may 
sometime  surmount  and  transcend  its  earthly  embodi- 
ment. It  is  the  old  question  which  Socrates  debated 
long  ago.  Some  one  "compared  man  to  a  harp,  and 
thought  his  intellectual  and  moral  life  the  harmony 
that  comes  from  the  vibrating  strings.  Since,  there- 
fore, he  is  essentially  the  instrument,  which  gives  being 
to  the  music,  the  music  cannot  outlast  the  destruction 
of  the  harp.  But  Socrates  insisted  that  man  is  neither 
harp  nor  harmony ;  that  he  is  a  harper  who  plays  upon 
the  physical  strings,  dependent  upon  them  for  the 
quality  of  music  he  produces,  but  independent  of  them 
for  his  existence,  since  the  player  may  leave  one  in- 
strument and  find  another."  ^^ 

Seeing  thus  that  we  are  not  necessarily  shut  out 
from  a  view  of  human  nature  which  makes  an  intelli- 
gent belief  in  immortality  possible,  we  are  entitled  to 
proceed  to  a  consideration  of  some  of  the  positive  rea- 
sons which  conspire  to  warrant  it.  These  are  numer- 
ous, as  we  should  expect  them  to  be  if  the  faith  were 
thoroughly  tenable ;  we  should  look  to  see  many  indi- 
cations of  its  validity,  rather  than  a  few,  as  in  all  the 
sound  generalizations  of  human  thought, — like,  for 
example,  the  stupendous  theory  of  evolution.  The 
spiritual  temple  of  our  hopes  does  not  stand  upon  a 
single  cornerstone,  however  precious,  but  upon  a  broad, 
firm,  symmetrical  foundation,  composed  of  many  stones 
*^  "The  Assurance  of  Immortality,"  p.  38. 


88  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

brought  from  diverse  quarries, — from  science,  phi- 
losophy, rehgion,  history,  the  teachings  of  prophets, 
saints  and  sages,  and  the  inmost  depths  of  the  com- 
mon human  heart.  Some  of  the  evidences  adduced  for 
the  doctrine  of  our  continued  existence  are  direct  and 
cogent,  while  others  are  collateral  and  corroborative ; 
and  it  is  in  their  correspondence  and  combination  that 
we  feel  their  full  force. 

1.  Let  us  begin  with  the  familiar  fact  that  the  soul 
is  not  always  so  completely  dependent  upon  the  body 
as  we  sometimes  assume.  For  we  know  that,  frequently, 
a  powerful  intellect  may  dwell  in  a  very  frail  physical 
organism, — like  that  of  Elizabeth  Barrett  Browning, 
for  instance.  We  know,  too,  that  a  body  may  gradu- 
ally fail  and  be  feeble  for  a  long  time,  while  yet  the 
soul  retains  apparently  all  its  vigor.  Why  then  should 
its  activity  and  potency  cease  utterly  upon  the  further 
deterioration  of  its  already  crumbling  house  of  clay? 
Furthermore  we  know  that  the  body  is  continually 
changing,  while  the  mind  never  loses  its  identity ;  I  am 
the  same  person,  and  know  myself  to  be  such,  that  I 
was  twenty  years  ago,  notwithstanding  every  particle 
of  matter  in  my  body  is  probably  different:  why  then 
may  I  not  persist  in  my  personality,  preserving  my  in- 
dividuality intact,  in  and  through  that  change  which 
consists  in  merely  dropping  a  worn-out,  useless  mass 
of  matter.?  ** 

^  Bergson  points  out  that  it  is  entirely  conceivable  that  life 
might  have  subsisted  on  earth,  and  may  subsist  elsewhere  in  the 
universe,  under  very  different  chemical  conditions  from  those 
which  our  bodies  exliibit.  He  says:  "It  was  not  necessary  that 
life  should  fix  its  choice  mainly  upon  the  carbon  of  carbonic  acid. 
What  was  essential  for  it  was  to  store  solar  energy;  but,  instead 
of  asking  the  sun  to  separate,  for  instance,  atoms  of  oxygen  and 
carbon,  it  might  (theoretically  at  least,  and,  apart  from  practical 
difficulties  possibly  insurmountable)  have  put  forth  other  chemical 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  89 

2.  When  we  turn  from  the  body  to  contemplate  the 
mind  alone,  studying  its  workings  and  measuring  its 
wonderful  powers  and  capacities,  we  see  that  it  is  pro- 
jected on  a  vast  scale  and  is  evidently  fitted,  intrins- 
ically, for  a  higher  realm  than  this  material  world.  Its 
thoughts  run  out  far  beyond  the  body  and  all  its  con- 
cerns ;  they  sweep  the  boundless  regions  of  space  and 
trace  the  stars  in  their  courses ;  they  penetrate  into 
the  depths  of  the  earth  and  learn  the  secrets  of  its 
history;  they  disentomb  the  buried  nations  and  read 
anew  the  forgotten  story  of  their  greatness ;  they 
analyze  the  operations  of  the  mind  itself,  divine  its 
possibilities,  and  prove  its  kinship  with  the  very  Spirit 
of  the  universe.  There  is  apparently  no  limit  to  its 
potential  grasp  and  growth;  knowledge  may  increase 
indefinitely ;  it  is  capable  of  eternal  progress,  so  far 
as  we  can  see.  The  same  is  true  of  the  moral  and  spir- 
itual life:  it   is   susceptible   of  unlimited  development, 

elements,  which  would  then  have  had  to  be  associated  or  dissociated 
by  entirely  different  physical  means.  And  if  the  element  charac- 
teristic of  the  substances  that  supply  energy  to  the  organism  had 
been  other  than  carbon,  the  element  characteristic  of  the  plastic 
substances  would  probably  have  been  other  than  nitrogen,  and  the 
chemistry  of  living  bodies  would  then  have  been  radically  different 
from  what  it  is.  The  result  would  have  been  living  forms  without 
any  analogy  to  those  we  know,  whose  anatomy  would  have  been 
different,  whose  physiology  also  would  have  been  different.  ...  It 
is  therefore  probable  that  life  goes  on  in  other  planets,  in  other 
solar  systems  also,  under  forms  of  which  we  have  no  idea,  in 
physical  conditions  to  which  it  seems  to  us,  from  the  point  of  view 
of  our  physiology,  to  be  absolutely  opposed.  If  its  essential  aim  is 
to  catch  up  usable  energy  in  order  to  expend  it  in  explosive  ac- 
tions, it  probably  chooses,  in  each  solar  system  and  on  each  planet, 
as  it  does  on  the  earth,  the  fittest  means  to  get  this  result  in  the 
circumstances  with  which  it  is  confronted.  This  is  at  least  what 
reasoning  by  analogy  leads  to,  and  we  use  analogy  the  wrong  way 
when  we  declare  life  to  be  impossible  wherever  the  circumstances 
with  which  it  is  confronted  are  other  than  those  on  earth." — 
"Creative  Evolution,"  pp.  255-256. 


00  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

provided  opportunity  be  granted  it  for  struggle  and 
achievement. 

Now  such  fitness  argues  proper  scope  for  the  reali- 
zation of  inherent  possibilities.  If  you  should  find  in 
a  zoological  garden  a  noble  bird,  with  mighty  wings 
and  powerful  talons  and  vicious  beak  and  piercing  eye, 
with  a  majestic  stride  and  look,  and  having  strength 
enough  to  kill  and  carry  off  a  young  wolf,  you  would 
say,  This  is  not  the  only  home  for  such  a  splendid 
creature ;  its  true  habitat  is  the  craggy  mountains  and 
the  clouds  of  heaven ;  it  is  none  other  than  the  proud 
eagle — give  him  his  freedom  and  let  him  soar  to  his 
native  heights !  You  feel  that  it  would  be  almost  a 
crime  to  keep  him  confined  in  a  cage  when  he  is  so 
clearly  fitted  for  a  grander  career.  So  it  is  with  the 
human  soul.  If  there  is  no  upper  air  into  which  it 
may  be  sometime  released,  we  can  scarcely  solve  the 
puzzle  of  its  marvelous  aspirations,  affinities  and  po- 
tencies. Surely  it  seems  reasonable  to  believe  that  it  is 
made  for  the  spiritual  heavens,  and  that  the  spiritual 
heavens  await  it ! 

3.  Again,  this  great  faith  is  confirmed,  in  a  two-fold 
way,  by  the  teachings  of  evolution.  To  be  sure,  this 
is  an  over-worked  term,  but  in  the  present  instance  its 
employment  is  justifiable.  Evolution,  certainly,  has 
thrown  more  light  upon  the  problem  of  man's  existence 
and  destiny  than  aught  else  save  the  Gospel  of  Jesus 
Christ. 

And  the  first  word  of  evolution  touching  the  present 
subject  reminds  us  that  the  universe  has  already  pro- 
duced man.  Here  he  is,  such  as  he  is,  with  all  his  pow- 
ers, capacities  and  tendencies,  and  we  know  him  to  be 
spiritual  in  his  essential  character.  His  existence  here 
is  the  one  great  miracle.     That  in  the  midst  of  this  ma- 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  91 

terial  scene  there  should  appear  such  a  phenomenon 
as  the  human  mind,  with  its  powers  of  thought,  emo- 
tion and  volition,  its  capacities  for  knowledge,  good- 
ness and  happiness,  and  its  possibilities  for  growth  in 
all  these  respects,  impresses  one  as  the  supreme  marvel 
of  the  world.  The  persistence  of  this  mentality,  this 
human  individuality,  through  and  despite  the  dissolu- 
tion of  its  physical  organism,  does  not  seem  half  so 
strange  as  that  it  should  ever  have  manifested  itself 
in  such  an  organism.  Evolution  warrants  us  in  holding 
to  the  continuity  of  Nature's  creative  principle,  and 
to  the  onward  and  upward  trend  of  development. 

"A  soul  shall  draw  from  out  the  vast, 
And  strike  his  being  into  bounds, 

And,  moved  through  life  of  lower  phase. 
Result  in  man,  be  born  and  think. 
And  act  and  love,  a  closer  link 

Betwixt  us  and  the  crowning  race 

Of  those  that,  eye  to  eye,  shall  look 
On  knowledge." 

The  second  word  of  evolution  respecting  this  prob- 
lem reminds  us  of  the  appalling  waste  of  spiritual 
energy  that  must  occur  if  the  individual  be  not  some- 
how immortal.  What  is  so  precious  as  the  mind  of  man 
and  its  products,  knowledge,  love,  goodness,  beauty, 
joy.?  What  but  these  makes  the  world  worth  anything 
to  us.P  And  if  all  the  spiritual  energy  throbbing  for 
ages  through  human  lives,  and  building  the  fabric  of 
civihzation,  and  transmuting  the  dust  of  the  earth  into 
learning  and  affection  and  holiness  and  happiness,  is  as 
ephemeral  as  the  fragrance  of  a  rose,  and,  though  in 
the  individual  soul  is 

".  .  .  strong  as  the  archangel's  caU" 

up  to  the  very  moment  of  death,  is  yet  to  perish  ab- 


93  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

solutely  in  the  next  moment,  dissipating  and  extin- 
guishing itself  like  a  skyrocket, — then  surely  it  seems 
the  most  wanton,  prodigal  waste  of  priceless  power  in 
all  the  economy  of  Nature.  It  is  not  enough  to  say 
that  the  energy  of  the  individual  is  transmitted  to 
posterity;  for  much  of  the  highest  and  richest  form 
of  such  energy  is  often  acquired  after  the  individual 
has  begotten  his  offspring,  or  may  be  possessed  by  one 
who  never  begets  any  children — like  Bishop  Phillips 
Brooks,  for  example.  Can  it  be  that  Nature  thus 
throws  away  her  highest  gains,  and  renders  man  him- 
self inferior  in  perdurance  to  the  works  of  his  own 
hand  and  mind.'' 

Richard  Watson  Gilder  listened,  one  night  in  mid- 
summer, to  a  phonographic  reproduction  of  the  music 
of  "Otello"  sung  by  "a  wonderful  tenor"  who  had  been 
"long  dead."     In  describing  it  he  says : 

"His  soul  it  was  that  seized  my  soul,  through  his 
voice,  which  was  as  the  very  voice  of  sorrow; 

"And  then  I  thought :  If  man,  by  science  and  search- 
ing, can  build  a  cunning  instrument  that  takes  over 
and  keeps,  beyond  the  term  of  human  existence,  the  es- 
sence and  flower  of  a  man's  art; 

"If  he  can  re-create  that  most  individual  attribute, 
his  articulate  and  musical  voice,  and  thus  the  very  art 
and  passion  which  that  voice  conveys, 

"Why  may  not  the  Supreme  Artificer,  when  the 
human  body  is  utterly  dissolved  and  dispersed,  recover 
and  keep  forever,  in  some  new  and  delicate  structure, 
the  living  soul  itself.?"  ^^ 

If  all  the  talent,  culture  and  personal  worth  em- 
bodied in  the  fifteen  hundred  lives  that  were  lost  with 

« Gilder's  "Complete  Poems,"  p.  390;  see  also  his  noble  poem, 
"Identity,"  p.  3T3. 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  93 

the  Titanic,  or  the  other  fifteen  hundred  that  have  just 
gone  down  with  the  Lusitania,  or  the  tens  of  thousands 
recently  slain  on  European  battlefields  have  ceased  ut- 
terly and  absolutely  to  exist,  then  it  is  impossible  to 
see  how  there  is  anything  in  the  spiritual  realm  corre- 
sponding to  what  the  scientists  call  the  conservation 
of  energy  in  the  physical  domain. 

4.  Another  reason  for  believing  in  immortality  is  in 
the  fact  that  it  affords  a  satisfactory  explanation  of 
death.  Death  is  the  counterpart  of  birth ;  and  if  it  is 
a  good  thing  to  be  born,  it  is  a  good  thing  to  die,  when 
the  right  time  comes — undoubtedly  it  is  not  good  to 
die  before  the  right  time  comes,  any  more  than  it  is 
good  to  be  prematurely  born ;  so  that  suicide  is  a  crim- 
inal spiritual  abortion.  But  both  birth  and  death  ac- 
cording to  nature  are  good,  or  else  the  order  of  the 
universe  mocks  us.  Of  what  use,  to  what  purpose,  that 
so  many  myriads  of  millions  of  human  beings  should 
swarm  into  this  world,  and  through  strife  and  pain 
achieve  some  excellence  that  seems  worthy  of  it  all, 
only  to  go  out  in  a  night  of  impenetrable  gloom.?  The 
only  adequate  explanation  and  justification  of  the 
whole  stupendous  process  are  to  be  found  in  the  pre- 
sumption of  a  continued  existence,  somehow,  for  each 
individual  soul,  wherein  what  has  been  gained  at  such 
frightful  cost  shall  be  conserved  and  carried  forward. 
Death  thus  becomes,  not  extinction,  but  transition; 
not  the  destruction  of  life,  but  its  transplantation. 
Death  then  is  really  only  another  birth, — a  great,  new, 
wonderful  birth,  but  as  natural  as  our  first  birth,  and 
perhaps  no  more  mysterious.  As  Henry  Ward  Beecher 
remarked,  "we  go  to  the  grave  of  a  friend  saying,  'A 
man  has  died';  angels  gather  about  him  above  saying, 
*A  man  is  born  !'  "    Surely  such  a  faith  solves  the  prob- 


94  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

lem  of  death  so  as  not  to  belie  the  great  principle  of 
beneficence  which  makes  the  order  of  Nature  both  rea- 
sonable and  just. 

5.  A  kindred  thought  is  that  immortality  provides 
opportunity  for  completing  the  spiritual  development 
begun  in  the  earthly  life.  We  are  all  painfully  aware 
of  incompleteness,  in  ourselves  and  in  others.  Even 
the  best  of  men  are  sure  that  they  have  not  accom- 
pHshed  one-half  of  the  work  and  growth  of  which  they 
feel  themselves  capable ;  and  the  worst  of  men,  however 
perverted  and  distorted,  undoubtedly  have  some  germs 
of  goodness  within  them  which  conceivably  might  be 
developed  under  favorable  circumstances  and  with 
time  enough.  The  view  that  this  world  is  only  a 
nursery  for  the  fields  of  paradise,  a  primary  school  in 
the  great  university  of  life,  a  single  stage  in  the  vast 
process  of  development  for  each  human  soul, — this 
view  meets  the  demand  of  our  innate  sense  of  justice 
for  time  and  scope  for  the  educative,  disciplinary  proc- 
esses of  Divine  Providence  to  work  out  their  legitimate 
results  for  each  and  all.  Our  present  hfe  is  not  ade- 
quate to  this  end;  indeed  for  uncounted  multitudes  the 
great,  blessed  task  is  scarcely  begun  here.  But  the 
story  of  each  human  life  is  a  continued  story,  and  is 
not  finished  when  the  end  of  the  first  chapter  is  reached. 
The  theater  isn't  out  when  the  curtain  falls  on  the  first 
act :  the  play  is  to  go  on ;  and  ere  it  is  completed  we 
shall  perhaps  see  that  it  is  not  a  tragedy,  but  a  grand 
drama  issuing  in  the  triumph  of  truth,  virtue,  love 
and  joy! 

Nothing  less  than  such  a  conception  can  stay  our 
weary  hearts,  can  make  us  patient  to  bear  up  and  toil 
on  amid  the  sin  and  sorrow  of  the  world,  can  give  us 
hope  that  the  disappointed  and  hindered  lives  that  have 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  95 

gone  forth  from  us  with  their  noble  desires  and  capaci- 
ties unfulfilled  shall  in  other  scenes  attain  to  the  fru- 
ition of  their  ardent  longings.  And  when  we  consider 
those  that  have  been  cramped,  distorted,  weakened  and 
almost  ruined  by  the  destructive  influences  of  wrong- 
doing, what  can  relieve  the  dark  picture  except  the 
belief  that  they  are  still  in  the  care  and  keeping  of 
a  Spiritual  Providence  that  forever  loves  and  chastens 
and  purifies  and  redeems?  An  exalted  faith  in  God  as 
"the  Father  of  the  spirits  of  all  flesh"  is  the  eternal 
ground  of  our  hope  for  each  and  every  human  soul, — 
the  faith  and  hope 

"That  nothing  walks  with  aimless  feet; 
That  not  one  life  shall  be  destroyed. 
Or  cast  as  rubbish  to  the  void. 
When  God  hath  made  the  pile  complete." 

5.  There  are  many  other  considerations  which  favor 
a  belief  in  immortality,  but  limitations  of  space  forbid 
more  than  the  briefest  mention  of  two  or  three  of  them. 

(1)  The  teaching  of  Jesus  Christ  concerning  the 
subject,  though  extremely  simple,  is  so  weighty  because 
of  what  he  was  that  it  is  entitled  to  the  very  highest 
esteem;  and  for  those  who  really  understand  and  ap- 
preciate him  it  may  be  said  that,  even  if  all  other  evi- 
dences for  their  faith  were  to  fail,  they  would  still  be- 
lieve in  a  future  life  because  he  believed  in  it.  As  a 
little  child  who  cannot  read  a  word  may  know  that  its 
parent  or  teacher  sees  a  meaning  in  the  printed  page, 
so  we  who  cannot  understand  all  our  own  experiences 
may  be  sure  that  Jesus  Christ  had  insight  to  perceive 
a  higher,  diviner  significance  in  human  life,  and  a 
more  glorious  issue  of  suff'ering  and  death,  than  we 
have  ever  dreamed  of.  Therefore  we  can  echo  the  wise 
words  of  Dr.  Theodore  T.  Munger : 


96  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

"When  the  clearest  eyes  that  ever  looked  on  this 
world  and  into  the  heavens,  and  the  keenest  judgment 
that  ever  weighed  human  life,  and  the  purest  heart 
that  ever  throbbed  with  human  sympathy,  tells  me, 
especially  if  he  tells  it  by  assumption,  that  man  is  im- 
mortal, I  repose  on  his  teaching  in  perfect  trust." 

(2)  The  well-attested  phenomena  of  true  spiritual- 
ism and  the  facts  patiently  developed  by  the  Society 
for  Psychical  Research  afford  some  confirmatory  evi- 
dence for  immortality  which  is  not  lightly  to  be  re- 
garded. After  making  due  allowance  for  the  self-de- 
ception, fraud  and  chicanery  that  have  infested  this 
border-land,  and  for  the  inevitable  cloud  of  uncer- 
tainty that  must  hover  over  it,  there  remains  a  large 
amount  of  evidence  which  it  seems  impossible  to  con- 
strue aright  except  by  postulating  the  immortality  of 
the  soul  and  some  contact  or  communication  between 
disembodied  and  embodied  spirits.  While  such  evi- 
dence may  not  be  sufficient  to  establish  independently 
the  great  faith,  it  possesses  a  supplementary  and  cor- 
roborative character  which  gives  it  considerable  value, 
and  which  may  indeed  become  determinative  as  inves- 
tigation proceeds  further. 

(3)  Finally,  the  arguments  for  immortality  may 
be  summed  up  in  the  supreme  fact  that  it  accords  with 
the  spiritualistic,  as  opposed  to  the  materialistic,  con- 
ception of  construction  of  the  universe.  To  illustrate : 
I  hold  in  my  hand  a  book,  which  consists  of  covers 
made  of  cloth  and  pasteboard,  of  leaves  of  paper,  of 
paragraphs,  sentences,  clauses  and  words,  with  punc- 
tuation marks,  all  printed  in  ink;  all  these  constitute 
the  body  of  the  book,  which  is  visible,  palpable,  sub- 
stantial. Yet  the  real  book  is  the  thought  which  it 
contains,  which  is  purely  spiritual;   and  this  soid  of 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  97 

the  book  cannot  be  seen  with  the  eye  of  flesh,  or  weighed 
or  measured  by  any  material  standards.  Even  so  the 
real  universe,  after  all,  is  the  spiritual  universe;  and 
God  and  man  are  living,  spiritual,  personal  beings 
dwelling  within  and  behind  the  material  forms  which 
constitute  what  we  call  the  phenomenal  universe.  Un- 
der this  conception  it  is  easy  to  believe  in  the  death- 
lessness  of  the  spiritual  part  of  man,  which  is  the 
real  man.  Such  a  belief  brings  order  out  of  chaos  in 
our  human  world,  and  makes  the  Spiritual  Providence 
of  time  and  eternity  intelligible,  beneficent  and  hopeful. 

What  is  the  value  of  this  great  faith.''  Clearly  its 
value  is  at  least  three-fold. 

1.  It  adds  dignity  and  worth  to  the  human  soul  as 
nothing  else  could  do.  If  man  is  not  merely  a  creature 
of  time  and  sense,  but  is  truly  a  spiritual  being  "made 
in  the  image  of  God"  and  made  for  an  eternal  career, 
he  is  at  once  "crowned  with  glory  and  honor."  Life 
instantly  takes  on  a  higher  significance  than  any 
earthly  scope  can  possibly  give  it;  and  earthly  scenes 
and  experiences  derive  their  chief  importance  from  the 
fact  that  they  minister  to  the  beginnings  of  a  develop- 
ment of  character,  through  education  and  discipline, 
through  struggle  and  sorrow  and  suffering,  through 
love  and  joy  and  holy  aspiration,  which  is  to  be  car- 
ried forward  in  the  heavenly  world.  Surely  a  being 
whose  hfe  is  projected  on  such  a  scale,  for  whose 
growth,  tuition  and  perfection  his  earthly  years  are 
utterly  inadequate,  may  be  truly  said  to  rank  "but  lit- 
tle lower  than  the  angels."  When  this  exalted  con- 
ception is  once  thoroughly  grasped,  the  slave  may  lift 
up  his  head,  the  criminal  may  lift  up  his  heart,  and  the 


98  MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

most  wanton  prodigal  may  say  in  penitence,  "I  will 
arise  and  go  to  my  Father." 

2.  The  thought  of  immortality,  especially  as  held 
by  those  who  earnestly  believe  in  the  universal  Father- 
hood of  God,  affords  a  comfort  in  bereavement  which  it 
is  impossible  to  obtain  from  any  other  source.  Hearts 
that  bleed  in  their  grief  and  pain  when  death  snatches 
away  their  dear  ones,  perhaps  in  the  very  beauty  of 
their  youth,  must  suffer  indeed  even  though  their  faith 
be  strong:  what,  then,  must  be  their  anguish  if  they 
"sorrow  as  those  who  have  no  hope^^?  The  darkness  of 
the  future  makes  the  present  desolate,  and  there  is  no 
relief  for  the  lonely,  yearning  soul  save  in  the  con- 
viction 

"That  life  is  ever  lord  of  death, 
And   love  can  never  lose  its  own." 

When  this  conviction  becomes  intelligent,  profound  and 
vitally  religious,  it  has  power  to  sustain  the  drooping 
spirits  of  the  saddest  mourner,  to  give  him  strength 
and  courage  to  go  on,  to  make  him  patient,  brave  and 
uncomplaining,  and  to  fill  him  alike  with  sympathy  to- 
ward his  afflicted  fellows  and  with  reverent  trust  in  the 
Eternal  Goodness.  The  hope  of  some  possible  reunion 
and  a  conscious  companionship  in  love  and  joy,  some- 
where, "behind  the  veil," — this  hope  is  indeed  "an  an- 
chor to  the  soul,  both  sure  and  steadfast."  Perhaps 
no  other  part  of  the  Christian  gospel  has  been  more 
full  of  blessing  in  the  past,  or  is  more  greatly  needed 
at  present. 

3.  Likewise  the  faith  of  immortality  has  power  to 
inspire  to  every  good  word  and  work  in  behalf  of  so- 
cial improvement.  What  can  adequately  inspire 
thereto  except  such  an  estimate  of  the  dignity  and 
worth  of  human  nature  as  immortality  implies,  together 


WHAT  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY?  9D 

with  a  firm  belief  that  the  spiritual  gains  of  the  indi- 
vidual and  the  spiritual  increment  of  the  succeeding 
generations  shall  be  conserved  and  perpetuated  beyond 
death?  To  lead  cultivated  men  and  women  to  bind 
themselves  out  to  the  service  of  the  ig'norant,  the  weak, 
the  vile,  the  criminal  members  of  society,  some  other 
motive  than  pity  or  self-protection  or  the  interests  of 
future  generations  is  necessary;  nothing  less  than  a 
passionate  appreciation  of  the  inherent  value  of  the 
human  soul,  begetting  a  love  for  the  individual  as  a 
child  of  the  living  God,  capable  of  being  redeemed  out 
of  all  imperfection,  has  ever  been  equal  to  this  holy 
consecration  In  the  past,  or  seems  likely  to  be  equal 
to  it  in  the  future.  But  the  Christian  view  of  human 
life,  carrying  the  doctrine  of  Immortality,  engenders 
and  in  every  way  strengthens  such  appreciation  and 
love.  This  in  turn  gives  us  the  due  sense  of  social  re- 
sponsibility, and  prompts  us  to  throw  ourselves  utterly 
into  the  task  of  helping  to  work  out  the  full  salvation 
of  humanity,  here  and  hereafter.  In  this  worthy  task 
the  individual  achieves  most  surely  his  own  best  de- 
velopment; and  if,  having  thus  lived  and  served  and 
grown  noble,  he  is  lifted  at  last  into  the  light  and  joy, 
the  opportunity  and  activity  of  a  higher  and  eternal 
world,  what  grander  outcome,  whether  personal  or  so- 
cial, could  be  conceived?  Thus  the  thought  of  im- 
mortality, especially  as  held  by  those  who  believe  ear- 
nestly in  the  universal  Fatherhood  of  God,  becomes  the 
greatest  spiritual  dynamic  of  a  progressive  civilization. 
This  is  indeed  "the  power  of  an  endless  life." 


TRADITIONAL    CHRISTIANITY   AND    ESSEN- 
TIAL   CHRISTIANITY 


^'TJie  appealing  personality  of  Christ  has  been, 
through  all  distortions,  the  regulative  power  and  the 
source  of  unity  in  Christendom;  and  the  more  it  stands 
out  clear  against  the  sky,  with  every  cloud  from  he- 
hind  and  from  before  it  sivept  away,  the  more  single 
will  be  our  apprehension  of  the  genius  of  our  religion. 

"It  was  the  Providence  of  history  that  gave  us  Him: 
it  was  the  men  of  history  that  dressed  up  the  theory 
of  Him:  and  till  we  compel  the  latter  to  stand  aside, 
and  let  us  through  to  look  upon  his  living  face,  we  can 
never  seize  the  permanent  essence  of  the  gift." — James 
Martineau. 

Another  parable  set  he  before  them,  saying.  The 
kingdom  of  heaven  is  likened  unto  a  man  that  sowed 
good  seed  in  his  field:  but  while  men  slept,  his  enemy 
came  and  sowed  tares  also  among  the  wheat,  and  went 
away.  But  when  the  blade  sprang  up  and  brought 
forth  fruit,  then  appeared  the  tares  also.  And  the 
servants  of  the  householder  came  and  said  unto  him. 
Sir,  didst  thou  not  sow  good  seed  in  thy  field?  whence 
then  hath  it  tares?  And  he  said  unto  them.  An  enemy 
hath  done  this.  And  the  servants  say  unto  him.  Wilt 
thou  then  that  we  go  and  gather  them  up?  But  he 
saith.  Nay;  lest  haply  while  ye  gather  up  the  tares,  ye 
root  up  the  wheat  with  them.  Let  both  grow  together 
until  the  harvest:  and  in  the  time  of  the  harvest  I  will 
say  to  the  reapers.  Gather  up  first  the  tares,  and  bind 
them  in  bundles  to  burn  them;  but  gather  the  wheat 
into  my  barn. — Matt.  xiii.  24-30. 


TRADITIONAL    CHRISTIANITY    AND    ESSEN- 
TIAL CHRISTIANITY 

THE  present  age  is  emphatically  a  harvest  time  in 
spiritual  things.  The  ripening  growths  of 
the  long  past  are  being  gathered  and  sepa- 
rated. Truth  is  being  sifted  from  error,  right  from 
wrong,  good  from  evil  in  more  directions  and  on  a 
larger  scale  than  ever  before.  It  is  an  era  of  culmina- 
tion, in  which  influences  that  have  been  at  work  for 
thousands  of  years  are  maturing  their  legitimate  re- 
sults ;  and  since  a  tree  is  known  by  its  fruits,  the  analyt- 
ical and  critical  processes  of  the  modern  mind  are  bent 
upon  testing  these  fruits  as  thoroughly  as  possible. 
This  attitude  may  seem  to  be  skeptical  and  hostile,  but 
it  is  really  animated  by  the  serious  and  noble  purpose 
of  discovering  and  liberating  the  truth,  in  order  that 
whatever  is  false  may  be  rejected  and  no  longer  darken 
the  minds  of  men. 

There  is  no  realm  of  our  life  to-day  in  which  the 
working  of  this  principle  finds,  or  needs  to  find,  more 
earnest  exemplification  than  in  that  of  religion.  We 
often  complain  that  there  is  a  great  deal  of  religious 
indiff'erence  abroad,  but  we  need  also  to  remember  that 
there  is  a  great  deal  of  religious  inquiry,  research  and 
reflection.  Never  did  so  many  cults  and  faiths  engage 
attention ;  never  were  so  many  systems  of  worship  and 
teaching  brought  forward  and  held  up  to  the  light; 
and  never  was  the  spirit  of  candor  in  studying  these 
more  widespread,  profound  and  catholic  than  at  the 
present    moment.     Men   want    to    ascertain    the    truth 

103 


104        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

about  divine  things ;  they  are  looking  far  and  near 
for  it;  they  are  hungi'y  for  conviction,  assurance,  cer- 
titude: but  they  are  persuaded  that  no  one  form  of  re- 
ligion has  ever  contained  "the  whole  truth  and  nothing 
but  the  truth" ;  and  because  of  the  very  preciousness 
of  the  high  spiritual  interests  involved  in  the  subject, 
they  cannot  afford  to  be  uncritical  in  their  testing  and 
sifting  of  the  world's  religious  products,  however  sym- 
pathetic they  may  desire  to  be. 

Christianity  in  particular  is  undergoing  fresh  and 
searching  reconsideration  to-day.  For  the  Christian 
religion  is  deeply  implicated  in  our  whole  Western  civi- 
lization, and  now  that  this  civilization  is  on  trial  for 
its  life,  by  reason  of  the  gigantic  cataclysm  which  is 
convulsing  Europe,  many  are  impelled  to  challenge  the 
claims  of  this  religion,  to  ask  what  is  valid  in  them, 
and  to  scrutinize  every  argument  adduced  in  their  sup- 
port. Has  Christianity  been  a  colossal  failure.?  are 
the  defects  of  our  civilization  due  to  its  inefficiency.'' 
or  has  it  never  been  really  tried  on  a  sufficient  scale  to 
enable  us  justly  to  determine  its  value? 

Before  we  can  answer  these  questions,  we  must  first 
ascertain  what  is  essential  Christianity,  and  then  see 
to  what  extent  it  has  been  rightly  understood  and  fairly 
promulgated.  The  broaching  of  this  two-fold  query 
intimates,  and  it  may  be  unhesitatingly  asserted,  that 
much  that  has  come  down  to  us  under  the  sacred  name 
of  Christianity  is  not  Christian  at  all,  either  in  the 
sense  of  having  been  taught  by  Jesus  Christ,  or  in  the 
sense  of  being  necessarily  implied  by  his  actual  teach- 
ing, or  in  the  sense  of  being  reasonable  and  true.  Jesus 
himself  said,  "Not  every  one  that  saith  unto  me,  Lord, 
Lord,  shall  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven;  but  he 
that  doeth  the  will  of  my  Father  which  is  in  heaven." 


TRADITIONAL  CHRISTIANITY  105 

Even  so  we  may  declare,  Not  every  one  who  cries 
"Christ !"  "Christianity  !"  "the  Church !"  is  truly  Chris- 
tian; but  he  who  grasps  the  central  and  fundamental 
truth  and  spirit  of  the  Gospel,  and  then  tries  to  live  it 
out  sincerely,  consistently,  and  faithfully.  If  there 
have  been  many  "false  Christs,"  there  have  been  more 
false  followers  of  the  true  Christ.  If  there  has  been 
a  sound  core  of  genuine,  valid,  and  holy  teaching  at  the 
heart  of  Christianity,  there  has  been  built  up  around 
it  an  immense  body  of  spurious  doctrine,  consisting  of 
myth  and  legend,  fancy  and  fable,  pretension  and  im- 
posture, as  well  as  a  continuous  admixture  of  foreign 
speculation  from  the  beginning  until  now.  Hence  the 
task  which  has  devolved  upon  our  age,  and  which  has 
increased  in  magnitude  and  thoroughness  and  value 
ever  since  the  dawn  of  the  Protestant  Reformation,  is 
that  of  severing  truth  from  error,  the  kernel  from  the 
husk,  in  historical  Christianity.  This  task,  exceedingly 
important,  is  still  far  from  accomplishment ;  but  it  is 
in  process  of  being  accomplished,  in  many  ways,  at 
many  hands,  in  all  branches  of  the  Christian  Church, 
— by  patient  scholars  and  thinkers,  by  humble  teachers 
and  preachers,  and  by  a  vast  multitude  of  those  whose 
only  means  of  proving  what  is  true  and  what  false  is 
in  the  great  school  of  experience. 

But  here  we  come  to  definitions  and  the  question  of 
standards.  How  shall  we  determine  what  is  essential 
Christianity.''  what  shall  be  our  standard  of  measure- 
ment.'^ and  who  shall  decide  where  doctors  disagree? 
The  answer  is  that  it  is  simply  a  problem  for  the 
human  mind  to  grapple  with,  and  on  which  to  employ 
all  its  resources ;  that  specifically  it  is  primarily  a 
problem  of  historical  and  literary  criticism;  and  that 
whosoever  has  any  contribution  of  true  knowledge  or 


106        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

valid  reasoning  or  illuminating  insight,  which  may 
throw  the  least  bit  of  light  upon  the  problem,  is  en- 
titled to  be  heard  in  seeking  its  solution.  No  scholar 
so  humble  and  none  so  great,  no  disciple  so  inconspicu- 
ous and  none  so  prominent,  but  that  he  may  have  part 
in  this  great  sifting  process  of  our  age;  and  by  just 
this  sifting  process,  widespread,  thorough,  patient,  pro- 
longed, we  shall  come  to  know  the  truth,  and  the  truth 
shall  make  us  free.  There  is  absolutely  no  other  way. 
No  Ecumenical  Councils,  at  the  Vatican  or  elsewhere, 
no  Papal  Decrees,  and  no  "Authority"  in  heaven  or  on 
earth  can  settle  such  a  matter.  It  is  simply  a  ques- 
tion for  learning  and  thought  and  the  cultivated  con- 
sciousness of  good  men  and  the  growing  spiritual  ex- 
perience of  mankind. 

If  this  statement  seems  too  strong,  it  at  least  is  not 
made  without  due  consideration  of  the  opposite  con- 
tention that  the  human  mind  is  incompetent  to  de- 
termine divine  truth  for  itself,  and  therefore  needs 
some  superhuman,  authoritative  teaching  and  guid- 
ance. But  if  the  human  mind  is  not  able  to  determine 
what  is  true,  how  can  it  determine  what  is  superhuman 
and  authoritative.'^  In  the  last  analysis  everything 
must  rest  back  upon  the  soul  of  man,  to  which  truth 
and  right  and  love  and  beauty  must  make  their  appeal 
upon  their  own  merit.  An  authority  imposed  may 
compel  a  certain  acquiescence  of  the  will,  resulting  in 
submission,  obedience,  outward  compliance;  but  it  can- 
not gain  the  inward  assent  of  the  reason,  the  sincere 
approval  of  the  conscience,  the  profound  sanction  of 
the  spirit,  and  the  glad  surrender  of  the  affections 
unless  these  be  freely  won  by  the  intrinsic  excellence  of 
what  it  offers.  The  alternative  is  clear:  either  there 
must  be  freedom,  the  freedom  of  the  soul  to  judge  for 


TRADITIONAL  CHRISTIANITY         107 

itself  what  is  true  and  right,  or  there  must  be  coercion 
in  one  form  or  another.  If  a  coercive  authority  be 
claimed  by  any  individual,  official,  or  institution,  who 
shall  validate  the  claim?  Mankind  may  need  some 
authoritative  teaching,  but  it  must  be  of  the  sort  which 
is  not  a  substitute  for  thought,  but  an  aid  to  thought. 
There  is  ultimately  no  escape  from  the  peril  and  the 
glory  of  bringing  every  subject  to  the  bar  of  the  human 
mind  and  heart  for  the  ascertainment,  as  far  as  finite 
powers  of  apprehension  and  comprehension  can  ascer- 
tain, what  is  true  and  right  and  beautiful  and  good. 
If  we  cannot  exercise  such  powers  and  pass  such  judg- 
ment, we  can  do  nothing  but  follow  as  we  are  led  and 
do  in  all  things  as  we  are  told.  Is  it  only  for  this  that 
the  peerless  soul  of  man  was  made.'' 

As  to  standards  in  the  solution  of  our  immediate 
problem,  everything  is  to  be  brought  first  of  all  to 
the  judgment-seat  of  Christ.  That  is  to  say,  Jesus 
Christ,  the  Founder  of  Christianity,  and  universally 
conceded  to  be  its  true  Representative,  must  be  our 
primary  and  principal  Criterion  for  determining  what 
is  essential  Christianity.  Not  what  Paul  taught,  or 
Peter  or  James  or  John,  not  what  the  Greek  Fathers 
or  the  Latin  Fathers  inculcated,  not  what  the  historic 
Creeds  have  said  or  the  Church  has  decided ;  but  rather 
what  Jesus  Christ  was  and  said  and  did,  when  clearly 
known  and  correctly  understood, — this  is  to  be  re- 
garded as  the  heart  and  soul  of  Christianity,  as  our 
true  standard  of  measurement.  The  two  phrases, 
"Back  to  Christ"  and  "the  Christianity  of  Christ," 
have  thus  a  definite  and  legitimate  meaning;  and  so 
our  next  step  is  to  find  out  as  nearly  as  possible  what 
the  Christianity  of  Christ  was. 

Here  arises,  to  be  sure,  the  further  question  of  the 


108        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

credibility  of  our  sources  of  information  about  Christ 
and  his  times  and  his  teachings,  together  with  the 
still  further  question  of  correct  readings  and  interpre- 
tations. But  these  collateral  issues,  though  very  vital, 
cannot  be  properly  discussed  in  the  present  chapter. 
Modern  historical  and  biblical  scholarship  is  dealing 
with  them  exhaustively,  and  the  reader  who  desires  may 
find  abundant  material  bearing  upon  the  points  thus 
raised.  Suffice  it  just  now  to  assume  the  broad  fact 
that  the  New  Testament  is  our  chief  source  of  knowl- 
edge regarding  Jesus  Christ,  and  to  maintain  that  the 
substance  of  the  truth  which  it  sets  forth  regarding 
him  can  be  fairly  grasped  by  the  ordinary  enlight- 
ened and  candid  person  who  is  unwarped  by  prejudicial 
influences.  If  this  were  not  so,  the  task  of  preaching 
"the  gospel  to  every  creature,"  the  task  of  making 
"disciples  of  all  nations,"  were  surely  a  vain  one. 

Now  the  picture  which  the  unbiased  reader  of  the 
Gospel  Narratives  obtains  of  Jesus  is  that  of  a  noble 
Teacher,  humble,  reverent,  heavenly-minded,  claiming 
for  himself  no  miraculous  birth,  no  perfection,  no  in- 
fallibility even ;  going  about  doing  good,  inculcating 
high  and  holy  lessons,  instilling  the  most  beautiful  and 
blessed  principles  of  life  and  conduct  ever  known  among 
men,  and  himself  exemplifying  them  with  wondrous 
fidelity  and  sweetness ;  calling  about  him  twelve  lowly 
men  to  be  his  disciples,  companying  with  them,  talking 
to  them,  educating  them,  and  exerting  his  uplifting 
and  sanctifying  influence  upon  them;  then,  after  con- 
vincing them  that  he  was  the  true  Messiah,  the  Christ, 
and  leading  them  to  an  earnest  acknowledgment  of 
their  faith  in  him  as  such,  dying  a  cruel  death  and 
leaving  his  sublime  cause  in  their  hands,  absolutely 
without  any  other  organization  than  was  naturally  im- 


TRADITIONAL  CHRISTIANITY         109 

plied  in  their  common  spiritual  experiences  and  their 
bond  of  union  with  him,  their  dear  Lord  and  Master. 
In  his  brief  public  career  Jesus  performed  numerous 
works  of  healing — precisely  how  many,  or  in  what  man- 
ner, or  by  what  power  it  is  impossible  to  tell.  He 
showed  a  compassionate  sympathy  toward  the  poor, 
the  unfortunate,  and  the  oppressed,  while  severely  cen- 
suring the  hard-hearted,  the  cruel,  the  unjust,  the  hypo- 
critical; and  he  bore  himself  as  a  brave  Reformer, 
through  his  high  and  searching  teaching,  with  refer- 
ence to  the  official  abuses  connected  with  religion.  Pie 
taught  the  doctrine  of  God's  immanence  and  Father- 
hood, His  nearness  and  dearness.  His  absolute  holiness 
and  love ;  he  set  no  limits  to  the  doctrine  of  man's 
sonship  to  God,  thus  logically  implying  its  universality, 
and  further  implying  the  id^a  of  universal  human 
brotherhood;  he  set  forth  righteousness  as  the  su- 
preme law  of  life,  and  love  as  its  supreme  motive;  he 
taught  men  how  to  pray,  how  to  trust  and  obey  God, 
how  to  imitate  and  love  Him,  and  how  to  love  and 
serve  one  another ;  he  called  them  to  repentance  and 
forgiveness,  to  simplicity  and  sincerity,  to  worship  in 
spirit  and  truth,  and  to  the  innocent  joys  of  a  pure 
and  benevolent  life ;  and  he  pointed  the  human  soul, 
tenderly  and  confidently,  to  the  beautiful  home  in  the 
immortal  realms,  but  without  giving  particular  infor- 
mation, without  much  argument,  without  philosoph- 
ical speculation.  He  simply  affirmed  the  great  car- 
dinal truths  of  his  Message,  and  left  them  to  make 
their  own  impression;  but  he  himself,  in  his  own 
spirit,  conduct  and  character,  was  their  best  exempli- 
fication— "he  lived  the  precepts  which  he  taught." 

Here,  then,  we  have  the  gist  of  the  Christianity  of 
Christ, — a   religion  without  priest,  ritual,   church,  or 


110        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

formal  creed ;  a  religion  of  reverent  gratitude,  trust 
and  love  toward  God,  and  of  fraternal  respect,  sym- 
pathy, love  and  helpfulness  toward  man;  a  spiritual 
religion  rather  than  a  ceremonial  or  institutional  or 
dogmatic  religion;  a  religion  of  vital,  quickening,  in- 
spiring and  sanctifying  power  over  every  soul  that 
ever  did  really  receive  it,  or  that  may  receive  it  to-day. 
But  now  this  essential  Christianity,  this  Christian- 
ity of  Christ,  soon  began  to  spread  abroad, 
and  as  soon  began  to  be  elaborated  and  corrupted. 
It  was  taken  up  by  the  brilliant  mind  of  St.  Paul, 
who  modified  it  in  a  peculiar  and  marked  way; 
by  the  writer  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  who  gave 
it  a  somewhat  different  shape ;  by  the  author  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel  and  the  First  Epistle  of  John,  who  al- 
tered it  still  further.  It  came  into  close  and  pro- 
longed contact  with  Greek  Philosophy,  in  its  various 
forms,  and  with  Greek  social  usages,  and  was  pro- 
foundly influenced  thereby.'*^  From  all  these  and 
other  associations  it  emerged  in  the  statements  of  the 
great  historic  creeds — the  Apostles  Creed,  the  Nicene 
Creed,  and  the  Athanasian  Creed — with  a  metaphysical 
character  deeply  impressed  upon  it.  It  was  thrown 
into  the  turbulent  stream  of  world-politics  in  the  Roman 
Empire,  from  which  it  suffered  a  pronounced  seculari- 
zation. It  was  embraced  by  St.  Augustine,  who  put 
the  stamp  of  his  mighty  individuality  upon  it,  with 
his  ideas  of  a  fallen  race,  a  ruined  world,  and  ever- 
lasting punishment,  and  of  the  Church  as  a  City  of 
Refuge.  Then  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  rising  in 
splendor,  adopted  the  resulting  compound,  and  carried 
its  elaboration  still  further  in  the  direction  of  estab- 

^  See  the  highly  valuable  work  of  the  late  Prof.  Edwin  Hatch 
on  this  subject,  published  as  "The  Hibbert  Lectures  for  1888." 


TRADITIONAL  CHRISTIANITY         111 

Hshing  her  ecclesiastical  absolutism,  and  for  a  thousand 
years  imposed  it  upon  the  nations  of  Europe.  Thus 
the  Christianity  which  has  come  down  to  us  is  not  the 
simple  Christianity  of  Christ,  but  a  complex  system  of 
doctrines,  partly  Judaic,  partly  Oriental,  partly  Hel- 
lenic, partly  Latin,  and  only  partly  Christian  in  any 
strict  sense. 

This  complex  system,  which  the  present  chapter  calls 
Traditional  Christianity,  has  contained  such  features 
as  these : — The  doctrine  of  the  immaculate  conception ; 
the  doctrine  of  the  virgin  birth;  the  doctrine  of  the 
deity  of  Christ ;  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity ;  the  doc- 
trine of  the  fall  of  man  in  Adam;  the  doctrine  of  a 
time-probation;  the  doctrine  of  everlasting  punish- 
ment ;  the  doctrine  of  the  Devil ;  the  doctrine  of  purga- 
tory; the  doctrine  of  the  sacraments  as  an  indispens- 
able means  of  Divine  grace;  the  doctrine  that  the 
Church  is  the  kingdom  of  God  on  earth,  and  is  entitled 
to  rule  among  men ;  the  doctrine  that  the  Pope  is  the 
Vicegerent  of  Christ,  and  as  such  is  supernaturally  and 
infallibly  guided  when  acting  in  an  official  capacity; 
prayers  to  Mary  the  Mother  of  Christ,  and  prayers 
to  the  saints ;  the  adoration  of  relics ;  and  the  imposi- 
tion of  fasts,  the  confessional,  and  a  celibate  priest- 
hood. All  this,  however  naturally  it  may  have  arisen 
and  however  useful  it  may  have  been,  is  not  Christian 
at  all,  either  in  the  sense  of  having  been  taught  by 
Jesus  Christ  or  in  the  sense  of  being  legitimately  im- 
plied by  what  he  did  actually  teach.  There  is  scarcely 
one  of  all  the  ideas  here  stated  that  can  be  found,  with 
its  customary  import  at  any  rate,  in  the  Christianity 
of  Christ  as  it  is  expressed  in  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount,  the  Parables,  and  the  casual  and  characteristic 
utterances  of  the  Master.     Yet  the  doctrines  or  con- 


112        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

ceptlons  comprised  in  this  strange  compound  have 
really  constituted  the  bulk  of  the  teaching  that  has 
passed  under  the  name  of  Christianity,  especially  as 
far  as  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  has  been  concerned 
— and  it  is  this  great  Church  mainly  that  has  given 
shape  to  our  Western  religion. 

To  be  sure,  this  doctrinal  system  was  considerably 
modified  by  Protestantism,  wliich  rejected  in  particular 
about  one-half  (the  second  half)  of  the  ideas  above 
enunciated.  But  the  rest  of  the  system  remained,  and 
indeed  was  accentuated  by  Calvinism,  and  has  furnished 
until  recently  the  staple  upon  which  the  souls  of  the 
vast  majority  of  Christians  have  been  fed  during 
nearly  all  the  centuries.  While  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  has  been  the  main  channel  and  the  chief  pur- 
veyor of  this  whole  stream  of  pseudo-Christianity,  it 
has,  nevertheless,  flowed  far  and  wide  through  other 
channels,  and  has  overspread  the  world  in  the  great 
movement  of  modern  foreign  missions. 

Now  it  may  be  a  fair  question  whether  this  Tradi- 
tional Christianity  has  been,  on  the  whole,  salutary 
for  the  peoples  among  whom  it  has  been  promulgated ; 
it  is  perhaps  sufficient  to  know  that  it  was  probably 
inevitable  under  the  circumstances ;  but  there  can 
hardly  be  any  question  that  it  has  been  something  very 
different  from  the  simple,  vital,  pure,  exalted  teaching 
of  the  holy  Founder  of  our  religion.  In  this  connec- 
tion the  words  of  Professor  Hatch,  from  the  work 
above  referred  to,  are  not  only  pertinent  but  ex- 
tremely weighty  because  of  his  recognized  scholarship 
and  judicial  insight.     In  his  Introduction  he  says: 

"It  is  impossible  for  any  one,  whether  he  be  a  stu- 
dent of  history  or  no,  to  fail  to  notice  a  difference  of 
both   form   and   content   between    the    Sermon   on   the 


TRADITIONAL  CHRISTIANITY  113 

Mount  and  the  Nicene  Creed.  The  Sermon  on  the 
Mount  is  the  promulgation  of  a  new  law  of  conduct; 
it  assumes  beliefs  rather  than  formulates  them;  the 
theological  conceptions  which  underlie  it  belong  to  the 
ethical  rather  than  the  speculative  side  of  theology; 
metaphysics  are  wholly  absent.  The  Nicene  Creed  is 
a  statement  partly  of  historical  facts  and  partly  of 
dogmatic  inferences ;  the  metaphysical  terms  which  it 
contains  would  probably  have  been  unintelligible  to 
the  first  disciples ;  ethics  have  no  place  in  it.  The  one 
belongs  to  a  world  of  Syrian  peasants,  the  other  to  a 
world  of  Greek  philosophers. 

"The  contrast  is  patent.  If  any  one  thinks  that  it 
is  sufficiently  explained  by  saying  that  the  one  is  a 
sermon  and  the  other  a  creed,  it  must  be  pointed  out  in 
reply  that  the  question  why  an  ethical  sermon  stood  in 
the  forefront  of  the  teaching  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  a 
metaphysical  creed  in  the  forefront  of  the  Christian- 
ity of  the  fourth  century,  is  a  problem  which  claims 

investigation. 

********* 

"In  investigating  this  problem,  the  first  point  that 
is  obvious  to  an  inquirer  is,  that  the  change  in  the 
center  of  gravity  from  conduct  to  belief  is  coincident 
with  the  transference  of  Christianity  from  a  Semitic 
to  a  Greek  soil.  The  presumption  is  that  it  was  the 
result  of  Greek  influence.  It  will  appear  from  the  Lec- 
tures which  follow  that  this  presumption  is  true."  ^'^ 

Toward  the  end  of  the  twelfth  chapter,  after  al- 
luding to  another  important  factor,  "the  interposition 
of  the  State,"  he  says:  "The  Church  became,  not  an 
assembly  of  devout  men,  grimly  earnest  about  living  a 

"  "The  Influence  of  Greek  Ideas  and  Usages  Upon  the  Christian 
Church,"  pp.  1  and  2. 


114        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

holy  life — its  bishops  were  statesmen;  its  officers  were 
men  of  the  world;  its  members  were  of  the  world,  bas- 
ing their  conduct  on  the  current  maxims  of  society, 
held  together  by  the  loose  bond  of  a  common  name, 
and  of  a  creed  which  they  did  not  understand.  In 
such  a  society,  an  intellectual  basis  is  the  only  pos- 
sible basis.  In  such  a  society  also,  in  which  officialism 
must  necessarily  have  an  important  place,  the  insist- 
ence on  that  intellectual  basis  comes  from  the  instinct 
of  self-preservation.  But  it  checked  the  progress  of 
Christianity.  Christianity  has  won  no  great  victories 
since  its  basis  was  changed.  The  victories  that  it  has 
won,  it  has  won  by  preaching,  not  Greek  metaphysics, 
but  the  love  of  God  and  the  love  of  man."  *^ 

In  conclusion  he  says :  "I  have  now  brought  these 
Lectures  to  a  close.  The  net  result  is  the  introduction 
into  Christianity  of  the  three  chief  products  of  the 
Greek  mind — Rhetoric,  Logic,  and  Metaphysics.  I 
venture  to  claim  to  have  shown  that  a  large  part  of 
what  are  sometimes  called  Christian  doctrines,  and 
many  usages  which  have  prevailed  and  continue  to  pre- 
vail in  the  Christian  Church,  are  in  reality  Greek  theo- 
ries and  Greek  usages  changed  in  form  and  color  by  the 
influence  of  primitive  Christianity,  but  in  their  essence 
Greek  still.   .   .   . 

"It  is  an  argument  for  the  divine  life  of  Christianity 
that  it  has  been  able  to  assimilate  so  much  that  was 
at  first  alien  to  it.  It  is  an  argument  for  the  truth  of 
much  of  that  which  has  been  assimilated,  that  it  has 
been  strong  enough  to  oust  many  of  the  earlier  ele- 
ments. But  the  question  which  forces  itself  upon  our 
attention  as  the  phenomena  pass  before  us  in  review,  is 
the  question  of  the  relation  of  these  Greek  elements  in 

"  Ibid.,  p.  349. 


TRADITIONAL  CHRISTIANITY         115 

Christianity  to  the  nature  of  Christianity  itself.  The 
question  is  vital.  Its  importance  can  hardly  be  over- 
estimated. It  claims  a  foremost  place  in  the  consider- 
ation of  earnest  men."  ^^ 

Thus  we  clearly  see  that  the  distinction  between  Tra- 
ditional Christianity  and  essential  Christianity  is  a  per- 
fectly valid  one.  The  beautiful  teaching  of  Jesus 
Christ,  which  is  our  standard  of  measurement  in  spirit- 
ual things,  is  a  far  more  simple,  vital,  moral,  penetrat- 
ing, religious  Message  than  the  elaborate  system  of 
Greek  and  Roman  theological,  ritualistic  and  eccle- 
siastical doctrines  prevailing  during  the  long  centuries 
could  ever  dream  of  being.  The  one  was  indeed  a  Gos- 
pel, a  "good  tidings  of  great  joy,"  to  comfort  and 
guide  and  redeem  heart-hungry  men ;  the  other  was  a 
scheme  of  ideas  for  intellectual  disputants  and  a 
philosophical  program  for  the  builders  of  a  mighty 
institutionalism. 

But  now  another  aspect  of  the  subject  appears.  The 
question  obtrudes  itself,  whether  there  is  any  relation 
between  this  traditional  Christianity,  this  pseudo- 
Christianity  compounded  mostly  of  Greek  speculation 
and  Roman  statecraft,  and  the  present  frightful  up- 
heaval in  European  society.  Before  dismissing  the  sug- 
gestion as  wholly  irrelevant,  let  us  reflect  a  little. 

Jesus  Christ  was  "meek  and  lowly  in  heart."  He 
inculcated  the  great  principle  of  mutual  service,  co- 
operation, brotherly  love.  He  said  to  his  disciples, 
when  they  were  striving  about  positions  of  prefer- 
ment, "Ye  know  that  the  princes  of  the  Gentiles  exer- 
cise dominion  over  them,  and  they  that  are  great  exer- 
cise authority  upon  them.  But  it  shall  not  be  so  among 
you;  but  whosoever  will  be  great  among  you,  let  him 

*»  Ibid.,  pp.  349-351. 


116        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

be  your  minister;  and  whosoever  will  be  chief  among 
you,  let  him  be  your  servant."  ^^  But  when  we  look  at 
Christian  history  as  a  whole,  instead  of  seeing  this 
spirit  realized  and  embodied  in  all  the  practical  af- 
fairs of  social  intercourse,  in  any  particular  nation 
or  among  the  nations  generally,  we  behold  for  the  most 
part  a  civilization  that  has  been  built  up  on  the  basis 
of  power,  a  civilization  whose  dream  has  been  dominion, 
whose  spirit  has  been  ambition,  and  whose  method  has 
been  competition;  and  traditional  Christianity — insti- 
tutionalized, ecclesiastical,  denominational,  dogmatic 
Christianity — has  been  shot  through  and  through  with 
the  self-same  false  conception  and  motive.  Hence  we 
have  had  an  age-long  cultivation  of  national  patriot- 
ism narrowly  conceived,  racial  antipathies,  religious 
bigotries  and  strifes,  and  the  whole  mistaken  ideal  of 
the  glory  of  supremacy  in  Church  and  State.  Because 
the  Christian  Church  itself  has  failed  so  largely  to 
learn  and  practise  the  Master's  great,  simple  principle 
of  cooperative  good-will,  it  has  not  been  able  to  teach 
it  to  the  nations ;  and  the  nations  have  gone  on  build- 
ing up  the  fabric  of  power  and  dominion,  each  seeking 
to  outstrip  the  other  instead  of  helping  the  other, 
and  ever  and  anon  fighting  one  another  instead  of  serv- 
ing one  another.  And  now,  all  of  a  sudden,  the  stu- 
pendous pile  collapses ;  for  what  else  than  a  collapse 
can  we  call  it  when  a  civilization  fails  to  maintain  it- 
self in  justice,  concord  and  prosperity,  and  exhausts 
itself  in  a  universal  orgy  of  destructiveness.'' 

There  was  the  greatest  need  at  the  beginning,  and 
it  has  increased  rather  than  diminished  during  the  cen- 
turies, that  the  European  peoples  should  be  deeply 
imbued  with  the  spirit  of  the  social  teaching  of  Jesus 

""See  Matt.  xx:20-28;  Mark  x:35-45;  Luke  xxii:24-27. 


TRADITIONAL  CHRISTIANITY         117 

Christ, — the  spirit  and  principle  of  mutuality,  good- 
will, kindliness,  friendliness,  cooperation.  For  be- 
cause of  their  geographical  limitations  they  were 
thrown  into  close  contact  with  one  another,  and  because 
of  their  racial  differences  it  was  inevitable  that  misun- 
derstandings and  strained  relations  might  easily  arise. 
All  these  conditions  have  been  aggravated  by  the  in- 
crease of  population,  the  multiplication  of  the  means 
of  intercourse,  and  the  stirring  of  new  creative  energies 
in  every  modern  nation.  Under  such  circumstances 
the  only  possible  way  for  people  to  live  together  is  to 
live  in  amity  and  mutual  helpfulness ;  and  if  the  Chris- 
tian Church  could  have  seen  this  and  taught  it  and 
exemplified  it,  sincerely  and  faithfully,  from  first  to 
last,  who  can  doubt  that  Europe  might  have  been 
spared  a  hundred  wars  and  saved  from  this  most  re- 
cent and  most  terrible  "abomination  of  desolation".'' 
Jesus  wept  over  Jerusalem,  saying,  "If  thou  hadst 
known,  even  thou,  at  least  in  this  thy  day,  the  things 
which  belong  unto  thy  peace !  but  now  are  they  hid 
from  thine  eyes."  ^^  Even  so  a  thoughtful  believer  in 
him  to-day,  contemplating  the  tragic  history  of  these 
nineteen  centuries,  may  well  mourn  over  the  blindness 
and  fatuousness  of  so  many  of  his  professed  followers, 
over  their  failure  to  understand  the  plain,  practical 
implications  of  his  social  Gospel,  and  over  their  con- 
sequent inability  to  represent  him  truly  before  a  needy 
world. 

It  is  a  striking  fact  that  in  the  present  dire  extrem- 
ity of  Europe  the  Christian  Church  is  apparently  pow- 
erless. She  lifts  no  effectual  voice  to  stay  the  strife ; 
she  scarcely  even  ventures  to  repeat  the  Master's  word 
— "Put  up  again  thy  sword  into  its  place :  for  all  they 
^Luke  xix:41,  43. 


118        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

that  take  the  sword  shall  perish  with  the  sword" ;  she 
simply  does  not  count  as  a  factor  in  the  case.  Why? 
Is  it  partly  because  her  own  skirts  are  not  clean,  be- 
cause her  own  soul  has  been,  all  too  often,  full  of  the 
spirit  of  ambition  and  strife,  because  she  has  loved 
power  and  sought  dominion,  because  she  has  coveted 
"all  the  kingdoms  of  the  world  and  the  glory  of  them"  ? 
Oh,  if  the  Christian  Church  could  only  have  taught  and 
practised  a  purer  Christianity,  the  Christianity  of 
Christ,  instead  of  that  divisive  traditional  Christian- 
ity which  has  so  largely  usurped  its  place,  how  differ- 
ent might  have  been  the  history  of  the  last  nineteen 
hundred  years ! 

But  of  course  it  is  vain  to  dwell  upon  what  might 
have  been,  except  for  the  sake  of  learning  what  ought 
to  be  now.  And  it  is  plain  now  that  if,  upon  the  ruins 
which  the  great  war  leaves  in  Europe,  a  new  civiliza- 
tion is  to  be  builded,  it  must  be  erected  upon  a  new 
basis,  which  is  yet  the  old,  simple  basis  of  the  Gos- 
pel of  Jesus  Christ, — the  principle  of  mutuality,  good- 
will, brotherly-kindness,  cooperation.  Else  it  will  not 
be  a  new  civihzation,  but  a  repetition  of  the  age-long 
story  of  distrust,  dislike,  jealousy,  bigotry,  injustice, 
cruelty,  revenge, — the  evil  spirit  in  the  heart  whence 
come  all  fightings  in  the  last  analysis.  Not  ambition, 
power  and  dominion,  but  meekness,  love  and  mutual  ser- 
vice,— this  is  the  social  genius  of  the  Christianity  of 
Christ;  and  it  will  lead  as  surely  to  the  increased  pro- 
duction of  wealth,  prosperity,  peace  and  happiness  as 
the  opposite  principle  leads  to  strife.  If  we  are  to  pros- 
per at  all,  really  and  permanently,  we  must  prosper  to- 
gether; and  the  world  has  grown  at  length  to  be  so 
essentially  one,  so  truly  a  single  great  family  of  na- 
tions, feeling  its  unity,  its  solidarity,  as  it  never  did 


TRADITIONAL  CHRISTIANITY  119 

before,  that  this  word  "together"  must  henceforth  com- 
prise all  mankind.  Each  nation  will  thrive  best,  in  the 
long  run,  where  other  nations  thrive  with  it — just  as 
a  business  man  whose  customers  are  making  money  will 
himself  make  money  by  reason  of  his  relations  with 
them.  If  the  people  of  the  United  States  are  to  have 
increasing  trade  with  the  people  of  South  America,  it 
is  to  the  interest  of  the  former  that  the  latter  should 
be  prosperous.  So  it  is  everywhere,  when  looked  at 
in  a  large  way:  the  welfare  of  each  is  bound  up  with 
the  welfare  of  all ;  cooperation  should  supersede  com- 
petition, men  should  help  one  another  instead  of  re- 
stricting one  another.  Yet  this  is  only  an  economic 
statement  of  the  spiritual  truth  of  brotherly  love  which 
Jesus  Christ  put  into  the  very  foundation  of  his  so- 
cial teaching. 

If,  then,  a  new  civilization  is  to  be  builded  and 
must  be  builded  upon  this  truly  Christian  basis,  the 
task  of  the  Christian  Church  for  the  new  age  is  per- 
fectly clear:  It  must  teach  men,  individually  and  so- 
cially, this  great,  simple  lesson  of  cooperative  good- 
mil,  and  must  practise  that  teaching  in  spirit  and  in 
truth.  It  must  give  over  all  its  old  dreams  of  power 
and  dominion  and  glory ;  it  must  no  longer  seek  to  rule 
men  or  nations,  but  must  seek  simply  to  serve  them; 
and  it  must  instil  everywhere,  and  exemplify  always, 
the  love  which  alone  makes  mutual  helpfulness  a  holy 
joy.  Upon  no  other  basis  can  a  better  human  society 
be  established  than  that  which  is  passing  through  the 
agonizing  conflicts  of  the  present  hour. 

It  is  undoubtedly  true  that,  in  the  readjustments 
and  reconstructions  of  the  immediate  future,  the  State 
in  every  land  must  bear  the  brunt  of  the  labor.  No 
longer  may  it  fall  to  the  Church  to  shape  political  poli- 


120        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

cies  and  practical  programmes.  But  it  is  the  high 
function  of  the  Church  to  inculcate  ideas  and  formulate 
ideals  out  of  which  practical  measures  may  grow  in 
due  time.  The  Church  can  be  the  Teacher  and  Helper 
of  the  State,  the  one  great,  spiritual  Ally  that  can 
speak  and  work  with  the  hohest  of  sanctions.  In  such 
a  service  the  Church  can  be  the  powerful  co-laborer  of 
every  other  educational  agency, — the  school,  the  col- 
lege, the  university,  the  press ;  and  all  working  to- 
gether, they  can  lead  the  nations  out  of  darkness  into 
light,  out  of  hatred  and  strife  into  love  and  peace. 

But  before  the  Christian  Church  can  well  perform 
her  part  of  this  important  ministry,  she  must  purify 
her  own  message  and  renew  a  right  spirit  within  her 
soul.  She  must  discard  some  of  the  hoary  errors  of 
traditional  Christianity,  accumulated  by  a  varied  proc- 
ess of  accretion  during  the  long  centuries,  and  return 
to  essential  Christianity,  the  Christianity  of  Jesus 
Christ;  she  must  begin  to  heal  her  own  divisions  by 
seeking  the  deeper  unities,  "the  unity  of  the  spirit  in 
the  bond  of  peace" ;  and  she  must  pray  continually  for 
a  humble  and  a  contrite  heart,  because  her  own  follies 
and  sins  are  partly  responsible  for  the  frightful 
troubles  which  are  now  shaking  the  earth.  With  such 
a  purified  message  and  such  a  chastened  spirit,  the 
Christian  Church  may  hope  once  more  to  speak  truly 
to  a  needy  world  in  the  name  of  the  crucified  Redeemer, 
and  the  long-sufFering  world — weary,  bleeding,  yearn- 
ing— will  hear  and  heed  and  be  saved. 

Finally,  regardless  of  the  European  war,  the  need 
for  such  a  sifting  and  cleansing  of  our  inherited  re- 
ligion as  is  here  indicated  is  rendered  more  urgent  by 
a  certain  broad  missionary  consideration.  Christian- 
ity is  offering  itself  to  the  entire  world  to-day,  and 


TRADITIONAL  CHRISTIANITY  121 

practically  the  entire  world  lies  open  to  it.  But  un- 
less the  form  of  teaching  that  shall  go  forth  among  the 
nations  be  purer  and  truer  than  that  which  has  pre- 
vailed since  the  second  and  third  centuries,  Christian- 
ity will  not  be  an  unmixed  blessing  to  the  various  races 
of  the  earth.  And  it  might  be  such  a  blessing.  The 
Christianity  of  Christ,  disentangled  from  the  pseudo- 
Christianity  of  the  creeds  and  the  principal  churches, 
would  prove  indeed  a  holy  inspiration,  a  baptism  of 
spiritual  power,  to  the  burdened  souls  of  men  every- 
where. The  human  race  in  all  lands  unwittingly  waits 
for  its  message  of  light,  hungers  for  its  bread  of  life, 
longs  for  the  quickening  which  its  simple  story  is  able 
to  impart.  But  in  place  of  all  this  the  Father's  chil- 
dren have  been  given,  mainly,  the  adulterated  mixture 
which  has  been  herein  summarized  and  characterized 
under  the  term  "Traditional  Christianity."  It  is  im- 
possible to  believe  that,  in  this  guise,  Christianity  can 
continue  permanently  to  win  its  way.  The  growing  in- 
telligence of  mankind  will  either  purify  it  or  reject  it. 
Therefore  no  service  which  the  true  friends  of  Chris- 
tianity and  humanity  can  perform  at  the  present  time 
can  be  more  fraught  with  spiritual  blessing,  in  the  long 
run,  than  that  of  thoroughly  purging  traditional  Chris- 
tianity, eliminating  historic  corruptions,  and  thus  re- 
leasing essential  Christianity,  the  Christianity  of  Christ, 
for  its  beautiful  mission  among  the  nations.  Let  the 
tares  be  separated  from  the  wheat  before  the  harvest 
shall  be  reaped  and  threshed  out,  to  be  again  sown 
broadcast  in  the  fair  fields  of  the  whole  wide  world! 
Then  shall  Jesus  Christ,  with  his  simple  and  heavenly 
Gospel,  really  come  in  power  and  great  glory ;  and  be- 
fore him  shall  be  gathered  all  nations,  and  from  him 
they  shall  receive,  in  deed  and  in  truth,  "the  words  of 
eternal  life"! 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  DEMOCRACY 


"Glory  to  God  in  the  highest,  and  on  earth  peace, 
good-will  toward  men." — Luke  ii.  14. 

"Whosoever  would  become  great  among  you,  shall 
be  your  minister;  and  whosoever  would  be  first  among 
you  shall  be  your  servant." — Matt.  xx.  27. 

"For  ye,  brethren,  were  called  for  freedom;  only  use 
not  your  freedom  for  an  occasion  to  the  flesh,  but 
through  love  be  servants  one  to  another." — Gal.  v.  13. 

"She  {the  Church)  should  frankly  recognize  that  de- 
mocracy paves  the  way  to  what  is  precisely  the  highest 
expression  of  her  Catholicism.  When  she  does  so,  then 
democracy  will  begin  to  yearn  after  the  Church  which 
continues  that  Gospel-message  wherein  democracy  finds 
its  own  remote  but  authentic  origin." — "The  Pro- 
gramme of  Modernism,"  p.  129. 

"The  Church  will  not  shape  political  platforms  nor 
formulate  economic  programmes.  But  she  will  bring 
her  thought  and  her  catechism  to  bear  upon  the  work 
of  so  tempering  the  wills  of  men  that  they  shall  be 
heroic  and  great-hearted  citizens  of  the  free  common- 
wealth."— Professor  Henry  S.  Nash. 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  DEMOCRACY 

THESE  brief  quotations  epitomize  some  of  the 
principal  truths  which  lie  at  the  heart  of  Chris- 
tianity and  democracy.  The  joyful  recogni- 
tion of  God  over  all;  peace  and  good-will  among  men; 
the  greatness  of  mutual  service  rather  than  of  power 
and  dominion;  the  privileges  and  responsibihties  of 
freedom ;  love  as  the  chief  motive  in  social  conduct ;  and 
the  building  of  strong  characters  that  shall  invest  their 
virtues  in  the  efficient  maintenance  of  a  free  and  just 
State, — these  are  cardinal  conceptions  of  the  Chris- 
tian religion  as  it  is  working  out  amid  the  ideals  of 
modern  democratic  institutions ;  and  they  imply  the 
profound  truth  that  Christianity  and  democracy  are 
but  two  phases  of  one  vast  movement  in  human  life 
which  means  welfare  alike  for  the  individual  and  for 
society,  on  both  the  spiritual  side  and  the  material 
side.  This  essential  unity  is  not  always  understood, 
either  by  churchmen  or  by  statesmen ;  but  its  due  ap- 
preciation will  reconcile  many  conflicting  aims,  will  give 
sacred  meanings  to  a  multitude  of  ordinary  labors,  and 
will  enlarge  our  hopeful  outlook  for  the  continued  prog- 
ress of  mankind. 

It  is  a  fact  that  Christianity  deals  mainly  with 
spiritual  concerns.  It  regards  man  primarily  as  a 
spiritual  being,  a  child  of  the  Eternal  Father,  and  there- 
fore an  heir  of  immortahty.  It  contemplates  all  his 
interests  from  this  high  vantage-ground,  and  guages 
the  accidents  and  incidents  of  time  and  circumstance 
by  the  scale  of  infinity,  seeing  them  in  the  broad  sweep 

125 


126        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

of  a  process  of  development  that  is  not  wholly  con- 
fined to  this  world.  Accordingly  it  lays  chief  em- 
phasis upon  the  things  that  endure,  the  things  of  abid- 
ing worth,  and  attaches  less  value  to  those  things 
which  perish  with  the  using.  It  exalts  true  principles, 
pure  motives,  holy  ideals,  and  that  inner  knowledge  and 
love  of  divine  truth,  that  harmony  of  soul  with  the 
Spirit  of  the  living  God,  which  Jesus  called  "eternal 
life," — beginning  here,  but  lasting  forever. 

But  true  Christianity  approaches  man  as  a  being 
on  earth,  amid  earthly  conditions  and  sustaining 
earthly  relationships.  He  is  born  here,  he  dwells  here 
at  least  for  a  time,  and  here  must  be  the  first  sphere  of 
his  activities  and  attainments.  In  the  concrete  af- 
fairs of  every-day  life  in  this  world — in  the  relation- 
ships of  the  family,  the  community,  the  nation ;  in 
marrying  and  begetting,  in  buying  and  selling,  in  com- 
manding and  serving;  and  amid  toil,  poverty,  suffering 
and  sin,  disease  and  vice  and  crime ;  in  the  face  of  ca- 
lamities and  social  tumults  and  the  mystery  of  death — 
in  the  midst  of  all  these  we  live,  and  must  learn,  and 
must  remember  that  we  are  children  of  God  and  broth- 
ers one  of  another.  Such  was  the  point  of  view  and 
the  constant  teaching  of  Jesus  Christ.  If  his  professed 
followers  have  sometimes  forgotten  this  fact,  and  have 
made  his  religion  excessively  other-worldly,  and  have 
imposed  upon  its  devotees  requirements  which  he  never 
dreamed  of,  "teaching  for  doctrines  the  command- 
ments of  men,"  it  has  not  been  his  fault.  He  himself 
was  always  perfectly  sane,  perfectly  human,  perfectly 
practical.  His  Gospel  was  a  message  of  glad  tidings 
with  reference  not  only  to  the  future  life,  but  pri- 
marily and  profoundly  to  thfe  present  life. 

On  the  other  hand,  democracy  has  to  do  mostly  with 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  DEMOCRACY      127 

temporal  affairs.  It  occupies  itself  mainly  with  earthly 
interests.  It  is  primarily  secular  in  its  aims  and 
methods.  It  seeks  the  well-being  of  the  individual  and 
of  society  here  in  this  world,  without  much  thought  of 
anything  lying  beyond ;  and  while  it  is  reverent  toward 
the  idea  of  a  Supreme  Ruler  of  the  universe,  it  does 
not  necessarily  imply  this — it  is  conceivable  that  de- 
mocracy might  exist  and  be  highly  efficient  without 
such  a  conception.  Conversely  it  is  entirely  possible 
for  men  to  believe  in  God  with  sincerity  and  with  a  ven- 
geance, and  yet  maintain  an  aristocracy  or  an  oligarchy 
of  a  cruel  tyranny — alas  !  how  often  in  history  has  such 
been  the  case ! 

Still  it  is  true  that  democracy  is  naturally  favorable 
to  all  spiritual  interests, — to  education,  art,  culture, 
philanthropy,  religion,  and  universal  good-will.  Whether 
we  regard  it  as  a  frame  of  government  or  a  state  of 
mind,  a  mechanism  of  social  order  or  a  disposition  of 
the  thoughts  of  many  hearts,  it  is  instinctively  the 
friend  of  every  generous  impulse,  every  liberal  policy, 
every  high  aim,  the  development  of  every  noble  capac- 
ity or  power  in  human  nature.  Therefore  democracy 
is  not  repressive,  but  stimulative ;  it  does  not  discour- 
age effort,  but  encourages  it, — encourages  thought,  re- 
search, experiment,  the  bold  initiative  of  the  individ- 
ual, the  new  cooperation  of  the  social  group.  Conse- 
quently under  its  ample  aegis  there  is  an  upspringing  of 
a  great  variety  of  voluntary  activities  which  result  in 
strengthening  or  refining  the  human  mind,  and  in  fer- 
tilizing civilization  with  increasing  learning,  skill, 
beauty,  benevolence,  and  virtue.  Simply  by  affording 
the  natural  man  scope  to  work  out  the  latent  good 
that  is  in  him,  democracy  becomes  the  promoter  of  his 
welfare  and  progress  by  as  much  as  it  lies  within  him 


128        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

to  advance  himself;  and  to  one  who  believes  in  the 
dignity  and  high  potentiality  of  human  nature,  rather 
than  in  its  total  depravity,  democracy  becomes  a  syn- 
onym of  hope  for  the  slow  but  sure  elevation  of  the 
race. 

This  agreement  between  Christianity  and  democracy 
will  appear  more  clearly  if  we  analyze  a  little  further 
the  real  objects  of  each.  What  is  it  that  Christianity, 
the  Christianity  of  Christ,  seeks  for  man-f*  and  what 
does  democracy  seek  for  him?  A  brief  but  plain  answer 
will  be  helpful. 

It  is  commonly  taught  that  the  grand  object  of 
Christianity  is  "the  salvation  of  souls" ;  and  it  is  com- 
monly thought  that  such  salvation  means,  not  merely 
deliverance  from  the  power  of  sin,  but  rescue  from  the 
control  of  the  Devil  and  the  terrors  of  a  future  hell, 
and  the  securing  of  an  abundant  entrance  into  heaven. 
Although  there  is  some  truth  in  this  form  of  state- 
ment, there  is  a  much  better  way  of  putting  the  case. 
True  Christianity,  the  Christianity  of  Christ,  seeks 
the  welfare  of  man  as  a  spiritual  being,  the  child  of  the 
Eternal  God.  Therefore  it  seeks  his  growth  or  devel- 
opment or  cultivation  or  education  or  discipline  in  the 
following  principal  qualities: 

Reverence,  gratitude,  trust  and  love  toward  God; 
consideration,  honesty,  sympathy,  love  and  helpfulness 
toward  man;  purity  of  heart,  integrity  of  character, 
freedom  of  spirit;  and  that  social  harmony,  prosperity 
and  happiness  which  grow  out  of  peace  and  good-will. 
To  realize  these  qualities  is  to  be  "saved,"  i.  e.,  to  be 
"made  whole,"  and  is  the  truest  preparation  for  heaven, 
while  establishing  the  kingdom  of  heaven  on  earth. 

Likewise  the  grand  object  of  democracy  is  the  indi- 
vidual and  social  welfare,  but  somewhat  more  narrowly 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  DEMOCRACY      129 

conceived,  as  relating  mainly  to  earthly  interests.  True 
democracy  seeks  principally  the  maintenance  of  these 
great  elements  of  such  welfare : 

Order,  justice,  liberty;  and  it  believes  that,  with 
these,  men  will  exercise  intelligence  and  virtue  and  some 
benevolence,  and  will  achieve  prosperity  and  happiness. 
It  trusts  generously  in  the  native  capacity  and  ability 
of  the  individual  to  do  for  himself,  to  take  care  of 
himself  and  those  dependent  upon  him,  to  direct  and 
govern  himself  with  increasing  wisdom,  honor  toward 
others,  and  regard  for  the  common  weal;  and  it  leaves 
him  entirely  free  to  pursue  such  forms  of  culture  and 
pleasure  and  religion  as  he  may  see  fit,  only  insuring 
that  he  do  not  abridge  the  corresponding  rights  of  his 
fellow  men. 

We  may  sum  up  these  two  statements  by  saying  that 
Christianity  seeks  to  establish  among  men  Reverence, 
Love,  Righteousness,  Freedom,  Peace ;  while  democ- 
racy seeks  to  establish  Order,  Justice,  Freedom,  leav- 
ing other  things  to  spring  up  as  they  may. 

Thus  it  appears  that  the  two  qualities  or  principles 
here  belonging  in  common  to  Christianity  and  democ- 
racy are  Righteousness  and  Freedom,  or  Justice  and 
Freedom,  meaning  the  same.  Christianity  seeks  to  es- 
tablish among  men  righteousness  and  freedom ;  democ- 
racy seeks  to  establish  among  men  justice  and  freedom. 
Christianity  adds  reverence,  love  and  peace ;  democracy 
adds  social  order.  Hence  it  is  clear  that,  as  far  as  it 
goes,  democracy  is  in  profound  harmony  with  Chris- 
tianity; only  that  Christianity  goes  farther,  includes 
more,  seeks  more,  means  more.  But  both  grow  out  of 
our  common  human  nature,  both  recognize  the  inher- 
ent worth  and  ability  of  man,  and  both  aim  to  help 
man  climb  up  to  the  noblest  heights  of  attainment  that 


130        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

may  be  possible  to  him. 

But  here  we  must  be  reminded  that  Christianity 
works  chiefly  within,  while  democracy  works  chiefly 
without.  The  one  quickens,  inspires,  invigorates, 
cheers,  comforts,  reproves,  corrects,  cleanses,  and  sanc- 
tifies the  inner  life  of  the  human  soul,  and  so  sets  it  free 
from  imperfection  and  wrong  desire  and  evil  purpose, 
and  makes  it  resolute  to  do  right,  to  seek  good,  to  obey 
the  will  of  God.  The  other  aff^ords  protection,  op- 
portunity, scope  and  encouragement  for  the  outward 
exercise  of  man's  powers,  and  so  opens  the  way  for  his 
tendencies  to  work  themselves  out,  for  his  talents  to 
increase  themselves,  for  his  nature  to  flourish  and  grow 
and  bear  fruit.  Both  give  freedom:  but  the  freedom 
of  the  one  is  inner,  vital,  spiritual;  while  that  of  the 
other  is  external,  social,  legal:  and  yet  both  kinds  of 
freedom  are  necessary.  Likewise  both  Christianity  and 
democracy  establish  righteousness :  but  the  righteous- 
ness of  the  former  is  that  of  a  soul  inwardly  set  to 
love  and  do  the  right  of  its  own  free  will  and  accord; 
while  that  of  the  latter  is  often  obliged  to  be  con- 
tent with  external  constraints,  restraints,  and  conform- 
ity to  the  decrees  of  organized  society:  and  yet  both 
kinds  of  righteousness  are  necessary. 

From  all  this  it  is  evident  that  Christianity  and  de- 
mocracy belong  together,  and  are  needed  to  work  to- 
gether in  this  world.  True  Christianity  is  democratic 
in  the  most  thorough  sense  of  the  term;  and  true  de- 
mocracy, as  far  as  it  goes,  is  in  fundamental  accord 
with  Christianity's  estimate  of  man,  its  service  of  him, 
and  its  hope  for  him.  Therefore  the  sincere  believer 
in  democracy  is  imbued  with  a  religious  spirit,  and  sym- 
pathizes with  the  words  of  Whittier  in  which  he  per- 
sonifies and  addresses  this  Angel  of  liberty  and  love: 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  DEMOCRACY      ISl 

"Bearer  of  Freedom's  holy  light. 

Breaker  of  Slavery's  chain  and  rod. 
The  foe  of  all  which  pains  the  sight, 
Or  wounds  the  generous  ear  of  God! 

"Beautiful  yet  thy  temples  rise, 

Though    there   profaning   gifts   are   thrown; 
And  fires  unkindled  of  the  skies 
Are  glaring  round  thy  altar-stone. 

♦        *        ♦        •        *        *        « 

"The  generous  feeling,  pure  and  warm. 

Which  owns  the  rights  of  all  divine, — 
The  pitying  heart — the  helping  arm, — 
The  prompt  self-sacrifice, — are  thine. 

"Beneath  thy  broad,  impartial  eye. 

How  fade  the  lines  of  caste  and  birth! 
How  equal  in  their  sufi^ering  lie 

The  groaning  multitudes  of  earth! 


"By  misery  unrepelled,  unawed 

By  pomp  or  power,  thou  seest  a  man 
In  prince  or  peasant, — slave  or  lord, — 
Pale  priest,  or  swarthy  artisan. 

"Through  all  disguise,  form,  place,  or  name. 

Beneath  the  flaunting  robes  of  sin. 
Through  poverty  and  squalid  shame. 
Thou  lookest  on  the  man  within; 

"On  man,  as  man,  retaining  yet, 

Howe'er  debased,  and  soiled,  and  dim. 
The  crown  upon  his  forehead  set, — 
The  immortal  gift  of  God  to  him." 

"Therefore,  too,  Christianity,  true  Christianity,  is 
the  friend  and  ally  of  democracy.  It  believes  in  de- 
mocracy because  it  believes  in  man;  it  believes  in  lib- 
erty because  it  believes  that,  given  a  fair  chance,  the 
good  in  man  will  mount  to  supremacy  over  evil  and 
will  lift  him  to  a  worthy  life.  It  trusts  man  to  think 
for  himself  because  it  believes  that  he  can  find  the  truth 
for  himself,  can  know  the  truth,  will  love  the  truth,  and 


1S2        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

in  time  will  be  won  to  obey  the  truth.  It  gives  man  a 
large  opportunity  for  independent  action  because  it 
believes  that  only  so  can  he  develop  the  latent  good 
that  lies  within  him;  and  its  restraints  would  be  re- 
served for  the  wanton  and  powerful  wrongdoer.  It 
bids  every  man  remember  that  he  is  a  child  of  God,  and 
therefore  to  lift  up  his  heart,  to  stand  upon  his  feet, 
and  to  walk  uprightly. 

Now  if  the  foregoing  considerations  and  reasonings 
are  valid,  a  few  important  deductions  follow: 

1.  Those  types  of  Christianity,  those  forms  of  Chris- 
tian administration,  which  are  not  in  sympathy  with 
democracy,  which  distrust  man  and  discourage  liberty, 
are  not  trtily  Christian.  Such  preeminently  (one  is 
compelled  regretfully  to  say  it)  is  Roman  Catholicism, 
whose  authoritative  deliverances  against  freedom  have 
been  prominently  before  the  world  since  the  condemna- 
tion of  "Americanism"  by  Pope  Leo  XIII  and  the  more 
severe  condemnation  of  "Modernism"  by  Pope  Pius  X. 
Without  lengthy  argument,  the  following  paragraph 
from  Professor  Walter  Rauschenbusch's  "Christianity 
and  the  Social  Crisis"  bears  upon  the  point  very 
forcibly: 

"The  Catholic  Church  by  its  organization  tends  to 
keep  alive  and  active  the  despotic  spirit  of  decadent 
Roman  civilization  in  which  it  originated.  Even  to- 
day, when  the  current  of  democracy  is  flowing  so  pow- 
erfully through  the  modern  world,  the  Roman  Church 
has  a  persistent  affinity  for  the  monarchical  principle 
and  an  instinctive  distrust  of  democracy.  The  chronic 
difficulty  encountered  by  the  Latin  nations  of  Southern 
Europe  and  Southern  America  in  making  free  institu- 
tions work,  is  probably  not  due  to  any  inefficiency  of 
blood  or  race,  but  partly  to  clerical  interference  with 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  DEMOCRACY      133 

government,  and  partly  to  the  anti-democratic  spirit 
constantly  flowing  out  from  the  Roman  Church  into 
the  national  life  of  the  peoples  under  her  control.  If 
we  ask  why  the  Church  failed  to  reorganize  society 
on  a  basis  of  liberty  and  equality,  we  have  here  one  of 
the  most  important  answers."  ^^ 

To  be  out  of  sympathy  with  democracy  is  to  be  out 
of  sympathy  with  the  deepest  and  strongest  social 
aspiration  of  the  present  age.  This  aspiration  is 
manifesting  itself,  indeed,  in  various  and  often-seem- 
ingly  contradictory  outward  forms,  called  by  differ- 
ent names,  such  as  Socialism,  Collectivism,  Commun- 
ism, Nationalism,  Trade  Unionism,  Cooperation,  So- 
cial Democracy,  Republicanism,  Feminism,  Nihilism, 
Anarchism,  and  what  not ;  but,  back  of  them  all,  the 
inner,  vital  spirit  of  humanity  to-day,  in  every  pro- 
gressive section  of  the  world,  is  a  mighty  longing  for 
social  betterment.  It  may  seem  selfish,  gross,  mate- 
rialistic, and  doubtless  frequently  is  so ;  but  it  is  sin- 
cere and  earnest,  and  contains  the  promise  and  po- 
tency of  a  higher  civilization  for  uncounted  millions  of 
mankind.  It  is  the  one  great  hopeful  fact  among  a 
thousand  dismal  facts  in  our  struggling,  suffering 
world.  The  hearts  of  men  everywhere  are  yearning 
for  a  freer,  richer,  happier  life :  this  is  the  secret  force 
underneath  our  social  unrest,  our  agitations,  our  de- 
nunciations of  the  existing  regime,  even  our  violence. 
With  increasing  intelligence  it  becomes  plain  that  a 
better  life  for  the  multitudes  is  possible;  then  the  con- 
science feels  that  it  ought  to  be  realized;  and  then  the 
resources  and  forces  of  humanity  begin  to  be  mobilized 
to  fight  for  such  a  realization.  We  are  in  the  midst 
of  this  manifold  and  tremendous  process,  the  essential 

«  Work  cited,  p.  193. 


134        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

nature  of  which  is  the  uplook  and  uplift  of  the  whole 
race. 

To  be  out  of  touch  with  such  a  vast  movement,  to 
antagonize  it,  to  misunderstand  it  even  is  to  be  un- 
christian;  for  Christianity  is  profoundly  humanita- 
rian, seeking  the  welfare  of  mankind,  the  salvation  of 
the  individual  and  of  society,  which  certainly  means 
fulness  of  life — health,  freedom,  comfort,  intelligence, 
virtue,  happiness — for  all  God's  children.  To  be  so 
blinded  by  the  interests  of  an  established  order,  either 
of  thought  or  of  administration, — in  other  words,  to 
be  so  absorbed  in  maintaining  an  existing  traditional- 
ism,— as  to  miss  or  misread  the  workings  of  the  Di- 
vine Spirit  in  the  souls  of  men,  even  when  they  are 
numbered  by  tens  of  thousands, — what  is  all  this  but  to 
be  like  those  rulers  in  Jerusalem  who  rejected  Jesus 
and  caused  him  to  lament  against  the  Holy  City  in 
the  sad  words  of  his  terrible  indictment,  "thou  knewest 
not  the  time  of  thy  visitation".?  Yet  such,  unfortu- 
nately, is  the  attitude  of  official  Roman  Catholicism, 
as  indicated  by  its  almost  savage  hostility  to  Modern- 
ism. It  professes  to  be  the  only  true  Representative 
of  the  Divine  Government  on  earth,  the  only  true 
Guardian  and  Guide  of  the  human  soul:  yet  it  fails  to 
recognize  the  voice  of  God  in  the  voice  of  the  people, 
or  to  feel  the  prompting  of  the  Divine  Spirit  in  the 
world-wide  aspiration  of  the  human  spirit.  It  de- 
nounces Socialism  and  Democracy  equally,  and  Mod- 
ernism seems  especially  hateful  to  it  because  it  shares 
the  same  secret  motive,  the  same  informing,  liberaliz- 
ing purpose,  and  is  the  latest  expression  of  a  fearless, 
progressive  mind  within  the  Roman  Church  itself.  But 
in  fact  Socialism,  Democracy  and  Modernism  are 
nearer  to  the  Christianity  of  Jesus  Christ  than  this 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  DEMOCRACY      135 

kind  of  official  Roman  Catholicism  can  possibly  be; 
and  the  truth  which  lies  at  the  heart  of  these  three 
manifestations  of  human  aspiration  will  as  surely  pre- 
vail over  this  type  of  Catholicism  as  the  light  of  knowl- 
edge must  ultimately  prevail  over  the  darkness  of  igno- 
rance. The  power  of  an  enlightened  and  free  religious 
faith,  coupled  with  that  of  a  just  and  liberal  social 
order,  will  overcome  the  obstruction  offered  by  the 
enormous  framework  of  inherited  Medievalism;  and 
thus  the  way  will  be  prepared  for  the  spiritual  teach- 
ing of  Jesus,  in  conjunction  with  popular  government, 
to  accomplish  the  social  development  for  which  the 
world  waits. 

2.  Christianity  and  democracy,  by  working  to- 
gether, can  build  up  a  true  kingdom  of  heaven  on 
earth ;  but  neither  can  do  it  alone.  There  is  slight 
ground  for  believing  in  the  power  of  democracy  sin- 
gle-handed to  redeem  society;  nor  is  it  easy  to  see  how 
Christianity  can  make  full  proof  of  its  ministry  with- 
out producing  eventually  a  democratic  society  as  a 
means  of  realizing  some  of  its  noblest  ends.  But  it  is 
entirely  probable  that  Christianity,  working  (so  to 
speak)  on  the  inside  of  man,  and  true  democracy, 
working  on  the  outside,  can  and  will  help  men  to  live 
like  true  sons  of  God,  and  can  and  will  transform  this 
world  into  a  veritable  paradise. 

Christianity,  whatever  else  or  more  it  may  be,  is 
essentially  a  spirit  of  life, — reverent,  believing,  hope- 
ful, loving.  When  the  human  soul  is  quickened  by  this 
spirit,  for  which  it  has  a  natural  affinity,  it  awakes  to 
new  activities  and  experiences  a  new  expansion. 
Thought  increases,  aspiration  ensues,  knowledge  grows, 
endeavor  is  heightened  and  enlarged,  and  the  whole 
inner  world  of  the  spiritual  interests  and  affections  is 


136        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

enriched.  The  truth  which  is  presented  in  the  life  and 
teaching  of  Jesus  Christ  is  thus  germinal,  and  when 
it  is  planted  in  the  mind  and  heart  of  man,  it  springs 
up  and  bears  fruit,  if  not  unhappily  destroyed  by 
overpowering  adverse  influences.  This  is  the  per- 
petual miracle  of  Christian  history, — the  spiritual 
quickening  into  newness  of  life  of  dull  and  perverse 
human  souls.  It  is  like  the  vitalizing  and  fructifying 
of  a  soggy  soil  by  sowing  into  it  the  seeds  of  those 
grains  or  grasses  which  possess  the  power  of  lightening 
and  fertilizing  the  ground  even  while  they  grow. 
When  once  "the  law  of  the  spirit  of  life  in  Christ  Jesus" 
really  impregnates  the  soul  of  a  man,  it  not  only 
makes  him  that  he  shall  be  neither  barren  nor  unfruit- 
ful, but  it  continually  increases  his  productive  capacity 
in  all  good  things.  So  Christianity  makes  its  appeal 
primarily  to  the  inner  life  rather  than  to  the  outward; 
it  addresses  its  truth  to  the  mind  and  heart  of  the  in- 
dividual, to  the  inmost  soul ;  and  it  trusts  implicitly 
that  its  holy  seed,  implanted  thus,  will  sometime  germi- 
nate and  come  to  fruitage  because  the  spiritual  forces 
of  God's  world  are  its  natural  allies. 

But  then  the  quickened,  expanding  soul  begins  im- 
mediately to  make  over  its  external  organism,  to  build 
more  stately  mansions  for  itself.  The  changing,  im- 
proving inner  life  incarnates  itself  in  a  better  and  still 
better  outward  order.  A  purified  soul  wants  a  purified 
abode ;  a  refined  soul  demands  refined  surroundings ;  an 
honest  man  will  have  an  honest  social  order  in  so  far 
as  he  can  bring  it  about.  Inevitably,  therefore,  the 
good  life  within  works  outward;  and  a  man  who  has 
caught  the  divine  vision  and  the  divine  purpose  will 
not  fail  nor  be  discouraged  till  he  has  set  justice  in 
the  earth.     Hence  it  comes  to  pass  that  mankind  is 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  DEMOCRACY      137 

forever  reconstructing  its  external  institutions — its 
creeds,  philosophies,  philanthropies  and  governments, 
whether  secular  or  sacred — in  accordance  with  its  pro- 
gressive inner  conceptions  and  convictions.  A  man 
with  a  Christian  mind  and  heart  cannot  sit  down  and 
sit  still  in  an  un-Christian  world,  a  world  full  of  in- 
justice, impurity,  ignorance,  disease  and  needless  mis- 
ery :  he  simply  must  rise  up  and  help  make  things  over, 
until  the  outward  order  shall  reasonably  harmonize 
with  the  inner  ideal. 

Now  if  Christianity  may  be  said  to  represent  the 
inner,  spiritual  half  of  this  great  process  of  human 
development,  surely  democracy  may  be  fairly  claimed 
to  represent — as  well  at  least  as  any  word  or  move- 
ment which  our  age  affords— the  external,  social  half 
of  it.  We  may  confidently  believe  that  together,  while 
neither  can  do  it  alone,  they  can  and  will  establish  the 
reign  of  a  true,  universal  human  brotherhood.  De- 
mocracy is  the  free  soul  in  action,  seeking  its  own  wel- 
fare, and  leading  to  cooperation  with  other  free  souls 
because  the  true  welfare  of  one  man  is  essentially  the 
true  welfare  of  all  men.  Such  voluntary  cooperation 
becomes  the  means  by  which  the  external  order  of 
society  is  made  over,  trusting  implicitly  to  the  inher- 
ent potency  of  truth  and  right  to  persuade  people. 
Critics  of  the  democratic  movement  allege  that  the 
freedom  which  it  involves  is  prone  to  end  in  license, 
wantonness,  rampage,  destructiveness ;  and  this  is  al- 
ways a  possibility,  even  a  liabihty ;  but  it  is  not  neces- 
sarily or  generally  a  probability.  Such  critics  forget 
that  freedom  is  a  two-edged  sword,  cutting  both  ways : 
if  sometimes  it  takes  the  form  of  crass  individualism, 
undue  self-assertion,  and  the  disregard  of  the  rights  of 
others;  on  the  other  hand  it  just  as  naturally  and 


138        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

surelj  takes  the  form  of  enlightened  association,  mu- 
tual endeavor,  and  the  combining  of  the  forces  and 
resources  of  many  for  the  common  good.  It  is  a  pure 
assumption  that  men  will  not,  ordinarily,  seek  their 
common  weal  by  common  effort.  Precisely  such  a  unit- 
ing of  brains  and  hearts  and  hands  is  what  society  is 
continually  exhibiting  in  a  thousand  forms  of  asso- 
ciation,— in  business,  in  philanthropy,  in  religion,  in 
politics ;  and  everywhere  such  associated  action  tends 
to  move  from  the  lower  plane  to  the  higher,  and  from 
the  lesser  interest  to  the  greater ;  in  other  words,  social 
life  broadens  and  heightens  with  the  progress  of  en- 
lightenment and  freedom.  Democracy  is  thus  the  great 
open  field  for  social  achievement,  offering  scope  for  all 
intelligent  and  virtuous  endeavor,  alike  for  the  individ- 
ual and  the  group.  It  is  not,  therefore,  destructive, 
as  many  suppose,  but  rather  constructive ;  and  espe- 
cially does  it  subserve  the  welfare  of  mankind  when 
vast  numbers  of  individual  men  and  women  have  been 
quickened  by  the  spirit  and  inspired  by  the  principles 
and  ideals  of  true  Christianity  to  "seek  first  the  king- 
dom of  God  and  his  righteousness,"  and  are  then  led 
into  various  forms  of  cooperation  to  establish  a  better 
social  order.  Such  a  blending  of  Christianity  and 
democracy  seems  to  be  the  one  great,  bright  hope  of 
the  world.  Only  the  beginnings  of  this  fine  blending 
have  as  yet  been  made,  on  a  large  scale,  but  they  af- 
ford the  promise  of  glorious  advances  in  the  near 
future. 

S.  The  goal  which  Christianity  and  democracy  thus 
contemplate  is  the  reign  of  truth,  righteousness,  lib- 
erty and  love  among  men;  which  will  bring  reverence, 
peace,  good-will,  brotherhood;  which  will  bring  also, 
and  just  as  surely,  health,  intelligence,  wealth,  leisure, 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  DEMOCRACY      139 

beauty  and  happiness  for  all.  Nothing  short  of  so 
comprehensive  a  good  can  satisfy  the  demands  of  hu- 
manity. This  earth  ought  to  be  a  paradise;  it  is  full 
of  riches  and  untold  possibilities ;  and  if  we  believe 
in  the  God  and  Father  whom  Jesus  proclaimed,  we 
must  believe  that  He  intended  it  to  be  a  blessed  though 
temporary  home  for  His  children  in  the  flesh — only 
He  appears  to  have  left  to  them  the  task,  the  honor, 
and  the  joy  of  making  it  into  a  paradise,  thereby  be- 
coming colaborers  with  Him  in  finishing  this  part  of 
His  creation.  When  men  shall  clearly  perceive  that 
this  is  their  task,  their  great  mission,  to  be  fellow- 
workers  with  one  another  and  with  God  in  carrying 
the  creative  processes  up  and  onward  to  the  produc- 
tion of  all  needed  wealth,  health,  knowledge,  beauty, 
love,  and  happiness ;  and  when  they  shall  begin  to  de- 
vote themselves  to  this  great  object  as  ardently  as  in 
former  times  they  have  sought  to  build  up  a  mighty 
ecclesiasticism  here,  or  to  secure  "an  abundant  en- 
trance" into  the  celestial  city  beyond,  we  shall  then 
begin  to  realize  the  passionate  dream  of  the  ages  and 
to  fulfil  the  purpose  for  which  the  Savior  of  the  world 
was  born.  Slowly  we  must  learn  how  to  do  this ; 
slowly  and  patiently  we  must  stumble  on,  through 
blundering  and  suffering,  into  the  light  of  knowledge, 
into  an  understanding  of  justice,  into  wisdom  and 
order  and  liberty,  and  into  all  spiritual  blessedness 
and  peace ;  and  we  must  know  from  first  to  last  that 
God  calls  us.  His  children,  of  every  nation  and  kin- 
dred and  tongue,  to  share  with  one  another  and  with 
Him  the  ineffable  joy  of  establishing  here  on  earth  a 
divine  order  of  life  for  the  entire  race.  Every  Church 
that  has  a  word  of  sympathy  and  encouragement  for 
struggling  humanity  should  lend  its  generous  aid  to 


140        MAIN  QUESTIONS  IN  RELIGION 

all  such  holy  aspiration  and  endeavor.  Never  did  a 
worthier  ideal  dawn  upon  the  mind  of  man,  or  a  worth- 
ier cause  engage  his  heart.  Let  the  inspiration  of  the 
purest  religion  he  has  ever  known  give  him  hope  and 
strength  and  all  kindly  counsel  as  he  seeks  to  incarnate 
in  the  concrete  affairs  of  the  social  order  the  heavenly 
vision  that  glorifies  his  soul. 

,  We  have  had  in  the  past,  mainly,  a  Christianity  that 
has  been  molded  upon  the  ideals  of  monarchy.  The 
world  has  been  full  of  monarchical  forms  of  govern- 
ment, full  of  the  names  and  deeds  of  lords  and  kings, 
princes  and  potentates,  mighty  conquerors  and  august 
emperors.  Inevitably  the  spirit  of  all  this  has  influ- 
enced the  Christian  religion  and  its  institutions  quite 
as  much  as  these  have  influenced  the  course  of  civiliza- 
tion. Only  recently  has  democracy  been  sufficiently  de- 
veloped to  be  able  to  react  with  any  considerable  power 
upon  Christianity;  and  at  the  present  moment  it  is  in 
greater  peril  than  ever  before,  in  peril  for  its  very  exist- 
ence. If,  happily,  it  shall  survive — Heaven  grant  that 
ib  may ! — the  ordeal  of  the  all-but-universal  European 
war,  it  will  arise  somehow,  sometime,  with  new  vitality 
for  its  unfinished,  stupendous  task  of  making  the  so- 
cial order  of  the  world  one  of  equity  and  freedom;  and 
an  important  part  of  this  task  will  be  to  instil  its  true 
spirit  into  Christianity  and  the  Christian  Church. 
When  this  great  work  shall  be  carried  much  farther 
than  it  has  yet  been,  when  Christianity  and  its  insti- 
tutions shall  be  thoroughly  democratized,  and  democ- 
racy itself  shall  be  thoroughly  Christianized,  there  will 
come  the  era  of  blessedness  for  which  the  weary  world 
has  waited  and  prayed  so  long.  A  purified  Christianity 
and  a  spiritualized  democracy  will  point  the  way  to 
peace  through  liberty  and  love. 


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